Adjusted Reality

“Reality can be beaten with enough imagination.” – Mark Twain

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Kerrville Pre-Race – becoming my alter ego, and… calm the @#%$ down, it’s just a sprint

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On September 19, 2017

In Uncategorized

I am reading a fantastic book called Calm the F*ck Down (The Brave Triathlete).

Yes, this is actually the title of the book…

I’m approaching my third and final sprint triathlon this season.  The first one was a frustrating exercise in showing me truly how out of shape I was two months post Ironman.  The second one showed some promise, somewhere between out of shape and where I was at last year (which made sense, since that’s about where my training was at the time).

For this race, earlier in the year, I had envisioned coming to this race fit, closer to race weight, and specifically trained to kick ass at the distance.  Ironman recovery took longer than expected, my motivation for adhering to a strict schedule ALSO took a while and to be honest, is still not completely there, and I really just felt like riding my bike all summer.  I suppose a loss of about 3 lbs depending on the day is technically *closer* to race weight, but my intention was to have a tri kit that fit and I didn’t feel like a sausage in, which has not been the case yet.  THAT in and of itself is also another novel post, so let’s gloss over that and get back to racing, shall we?

Where I’m actually at right now is pretty all-around decently fit even though the scale is still laughing at me.  I don’t have the utmost confidence of a full season of consistent training, but I’ve had some workouts lately where I have surprised myself.  Also, this is a race that is set up for my success.  The bike course is relatively flat and fast.  It’s my second to best sprint bike split back from 2011 when I had no business getting my second best sprint bike split (I didn’t even have clipless pedals yet).  The run is on concrete, not kitty litter, and also pretty flat and shaded.  However, this one also seems a little more competitive in terms of where I’m likely to place in my age group, but the only thing I can do is show up and see what happens.

I’m sure this is going to sound like John Madden type commentary, but what’s really going to make the difference is how hard I can hammer the bike, and how my legs (and brain) feel at the start of the run.  I finally found the entrance to my pain cave again late this summer.  I’m still stepping into it apprehensively, there’s no “eff yeah, let’s go hurt ourselves today” attitude back yet, but I’m finding that once I get going, I can open the cave door and spend some time inside again instead of my body and brain immediately freaking out and going:

Here are things that I have done recently to give me some proverbial feathers in my cap:

  • I have ridden 100 miles and have not been too wrecked at the end at a not-completely-embarrassing speed.
  • I rode about 6 miles on the bike at about 20.5 mph average for the speed loop part of the bike and I was breathing hard but also chatting a little.
  • I ran 9:30 min/miles off a hard bike for 2 miles and was chatting in multiple word phrases on the first mile and also not completely shelled after.
  • I have seen 8s on the run for a little bit whilst really pushing myself.
  • I have done all these things without caffeine and some at the end of a long workday in the relatively hotter-than-race-day weather.
  • I’ve done an Ironman, which actually means absolutely nothing in this context except I’m too damn stupid and stubborn to quit hurting myself by moving forward rather slowly for 15+ hours in a single day.  And I like to remind the world that I’m an Ironman.

So, there are two sports psychology things I’m taking into this race.

Thing one – I’m crazy in the brainpan.  No wait, that’s not it…

First of all, like I usually do, I’m going to set goals and intentions for this week and that day.  But, we’ll do this a little differently.  First, I’m going to get all the insecure crap out now.  Here we go…

You’re too heavy to PR/podium you haven’t trained enough Ironman training wrecked all your speed forever all the fit girls are way faster than you especially after a full season of training and you’re going eff something up and  finish in the bottom half of your age group and then whine about it all weekend…

*record scratch*

Ok, beyond THIS point, we leave all the negativity and bullshit behind and I’ll walk you through the perfect race weekend.

I wake up on Friday refreshed and relaxed and excited.  I’ve had at least 8 hours of sleep every day this week and I’m ready for the trip up to Kerrville and reasonably calm.  I’ve got everything packed and I’ve thought ahead to pack all my tri gear in separate bags so I can put them right into the T1 and T2 bags.

I eat my normal breakfast, lunch, and snacks.  At 2pm, everything is settled at work and we head out.  The drive is uneventful, and so is packet pickup.  We have everything dropped off for the race and are done by 7pm.  At that time, we drive to our campsite, do minimal set up – just what we need to function for the night – eat our sandwiches, have some sleepytime tea, and go to bed.

After a restful night of sleep, we’re up and to the race site around 6am.  I’ll eat half a sunbutter and jelly sandwich and have some tea for caffeine and a coconut water for electrolytes.  I’ll get my tires pumped up, drop off my bottles, arrange my T1 area, and then get in the porta potty line and take care of all that nonsense while nomming some caffeinated blocks.

Then, as I approach the water, I become Sapphyra, the badass barbarian warrior chick who is going to fearlessly dominate the course.

Sapphyra conquers things.  Especially large rocks.

Ok, don’t laugh.  Fine, you totally can because I am honestly laughing at myself a little.  I need a slight break in the positive-only mandate with some some not-so-sunshine-and-rainbows thoughts from the past to explain what this is and why I’m doing it.

/rose colored glasses off

Part of the Brave Triathlete book that I really identified with was showing up as your alter ego (the version of yourself you want to race as).  Yes, this is a video game avatar, which has nothing to do with triathlon, but, here’s the thing.  Becoming Sapphyra made me feel strong and powerful in times where I was horribly obese, out of shape, and didn’t have that much going for me in life besides a powerful avatar.  She was confident and up to any challenge.

Ever since I (low speed) crashed and fell apart afterwards at this race two years ago, something has been broken in me more often than not on race morning.  I used to show up with big dreams and goals, scary ones, ones that I didn’t always reach but that’s okay, and most importantly, be SO EXCITED to go toe that line and see where ended up.  Now, I’m somewhere between calm and numb and full of ennui about the day.  Even Ironman morning I wasn’t so much crapping my pants like I expected, I was just worried about finishing using the bathroom for the fiftieth time before they closed the start line.

Sapphyra, however, is not apathetic.

/rose colored glasses back on

Sapphyra is unreasonably excited to have a reason and an arena to test her mettle.  She’ll look at that start line, at the competition, at the dawning day with eager anticipation to just get this thing STARTED ALREADY.  She’s hungry to find the entrance to the pain cave quickly, get inside, and start digging to see how deep it goes.  She’s eager to see if she can condense all the effort of 15+ hours of an Ironman into under 90 minutes.  She’s interested to see how she can use a course that is SO in her wheelhouse and cooler weather to dominate.

Sapphyra will line up in the right place for the swim, which is not at the back of the pack.  When she hits the water, she’ll concentrate on smooth form but also push the pace as much as possible without blowing up.  She will not sit behind anyone and she’ll swim aggressively (without being mean).  She’ll realize that she cannot win the triathlon in the swim and swim smart and not outside herself, but not lose focus and take the pedal off the gas.

She will move expediently but not rush through transition.  Once she hits the mount line for the bike, she’ll kick it into badass warrior overdrive (weather permitting – if we have rain, it will be semi-safe sort-of-overdrive on the turns).  She will cycle aggressively, building speed on flats and false flats, recovering on the downhills only when the Garmin reads 23+ mph.  She will take a salted watermelon gu that will already be ripped open in her bento box on the first long downhill section, drink a few times, but otherwise just effing hammer the bike as fast and as hard as possible with literally no regard for the run.  What run?  Are we running after this?  I’ll deal with that later.

Maybe the last mile, after entering the park, she’ll recover a bit.  She will do the same expedient but not rushed change from bike shoes to Hokas and get out of transition as quickly as possible because THAT TRANSITION IS HOT LAVA.

Here’s the epic quest.  She will get out on the run course and fight all the brain demons that tell her to slow down.  She’ll take her big ol’ two handed sword and slash the leg fatigue and the lungs screaming “NOOOOO” and the voices that say “slow down, you’re not a good runner anymore” and all the frustration that I rarely run at my potential during these things and that I’d actually be a podium contender sometimes if I could stop tanking this last leg of the race.  Not today, because eff that noise and nonsense.

She will get out on the course and find the highest level of hurt she can maintain for the distance.  She will concentrate on good posture and form and get a mantra in her head that helps keep the pace while rhythmically chanting it.  She will stay within herself but also look for people ahead of her and go “fishing”, especially those in her age group.  The last mile, she will turn it up one more notch and give a kick at the turnaround when she can see the finish.

Then, she’ll cross the line and become me again, and make a beeline for the food and the beer.

Barbarian badass recovery program…

I am really sure that I’m making wayyy too big a big deal out of a little race, but it’s good practice.  The last thing I want to do is have a completely untested strategy when I approach one of these that really DOES really really matter to me.  So, even though it feels a little ridiculous, Sapphyra will be making her triathlon debut Saturday morning.

So, Sapphyra’s triathlon goals are:

  • A strong swim.  No idea what this means right now but it’s 10-ish minutes of my race I just want to get over with as quickly as possible while not wrecking the rest of my day.
  • 20+ mph on the bike.  It’s been my goal for a while, I feel very fit on the bike and this is one of the better courses for me to try for it.  Let’s do this!
  • A run with an average in the 9s.  8s would be awesome and maybe I’ll have enough caffeine and magical unicorn dust and badass secret identity mojo to do it.  However, I want to at least run sub-10 min/mile and run near the edge – outside my comfort zone, just before redlining.

Wish me/her luck this weekend!

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August and then everything after…

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On September 5, 2017

In Uncategorized

I’ve got a lot going on this month, so instead of the weekly thing, I wanted to lay September out for the month.

Here’s what happens when I get lazy with instagramming for a few days.  You get the picture version of a training (and junk food) montage.

So, let’s get on with it, shall we?

In August, I rode bikes.  A lot.  It was my highest cycling month since January with almost 400 miles (and unlike January, it wasn’t cheat-y trainer miles because I rode mostly outside and my trainer is now HARDER than outside so…).  I ran and swam very little, but enough to remember how to move my arms and legs the right way, sort of.  I raced a triathlon and felt better about my performance than the same course back in June.  I rode 100 miles and was pretty happy with life after.

In September, I plan to be a *little* more balanced.  On the weekends, I still have rides planned but most of them say MEDIUM length (aka – 40-60 miles – which is medium in my life right now, heh).  Now that I proved 100 is doable, I feel like I just need one more long one a few weeks out of the next 100 and I’ll be fine as long as I keep the volume about the same.  I built some great bike base when I didn’t feel  like doing much else in the way of training this summer, and I’m pretty sure the next time I build to race a half ironman or ironman, that experience will help me out.

But… it’s time to change it up a little bit.  I have one more sprint triathlon Sept 23rd.  I should probably make it a point to run more than 12 miles and swim more than 3 in September, unlike August.  I still plan to bike more than the other sports, but maybe at least pretend like I’m a triathlete again, sorta kinda.

Last week I rode bikes for about 3 hours (in one shot), played DDR for about an hour, and then the last hour was split between a run and a swim.  It was a good recovery week after the 100 mile ride.

Here’s what I have planned for this week:

  • Runs: lunch run (probably about a 3 mile lake interval run), 2 mile brick run (chasing the faster people on my tri team)
  • Swims: sadly, with everything else, I only have time for one and it’s already done (unless I squeeze in another one while camping).  I’ll change this up the next week.
  • Weights: new program x2 (back to it after a week break), some DDR if I can work it in
  • Bike: 35 mile bike adventure Labor Day, 25 mile bike commute to/from work Tuesday, 12-ish mile brick bike Wednesday, 50-ish mile ride at Granger Lake on Saturday.
  • 11-ish hours as planned

So, yeah.  You can see where my priorities lie.  I am having fun riding bikes and I know in the next few months I need to shift to running if I want to make 3M Half Marathon my A race.  While that sounds like the worst thing in the world to me right now, I also know as soon as the temps drop I will be out there loving running and biking will be a little less awesome when I have to wear 20 layers and still can’t feel warm.  But also it might be still as awesome and I’ll see how things go.

Kind of secretly healthy.  Would have been healthier if they weren’t out of every single wheat bun at the grocery store ><.

August was rough for various reasons.  I actually had a few really good weeks in spite of it but there was work overtime (with catered food) and camping and one week where I just couldn’t even with any sort of effort for anything.

Here’s the wins – I’m eating much healthier than I was before.  While I still put things in my mouth that are negatives on the Diet Quality scale, I’m eating much more of the things that give me points like more fruits, veggies, whole grains, and nuts.  I’m slowly attacking the fact that I eat like a human garbage disposal on the weekends with strategy (pre-made salads/easy access veggies that are appealing, keeping pistachios like EVERYWHERE so I can eat them as a salty snack, etc).  I started making some progress with the booze calories and then I think my inner child twenty-one year old threw a tantrum with all the other diet cleanup I’m trying to do, so it’s one step forward, two steps back there.

But I think I’m ready to take another step forward, so here’s my goals for September:

Actually measure out the drinks I want to have when I’m home and try to stick to them.  I plan every-effing-thing else, and maybe that’s tipsy-me rebelling against stick-up-her-butt me, but just the act of setting aside a portion helps when I can make myself do it.  Just like taking a serving of chips or ice cream or anything else and having that instead of just allowing yourself to consume from the container, it’s all about portion control.

Continue to work on what I put in my mouth on the weekends.  I have done better with this and I feel like this is starting to be a habit, but definitely needs another month of focus.  I’ve done much better with veggies, but fruits and nuts can get ignored in lieu of junk food and whole grains sometimes become refined.  There’s some room for this but doing better is always a good goal.

Abide by the deficit a little more strictly.  I’ve had a few weeks with a pretty small deficit, and it’s proven that people tend to completely underestimate their consumption when tracking.  So, if I want to make progress here, I need to eat less than I am currently.  I make slow progress when I stay close to -1000 on fitbit (which seems to work out closer to -500/-600 on the garmin).  Hopefully, not going quite as crazy with the 70-100 mile rides will help me not want to eat small cities at mealtimes.

Here’s the numbers from last week.

  • Weight: 188.8 (+0.9) lbs
  • Avg cal per day: 1839(-743) calories
  • Avg deficit per day: 998 (+431) calories/Garmin average deficit: 621 (+454)
  • Macros: 58 (-23)g fat, 190 (-54)g carbs, 107 (-2)g protein, 28(+3)g fiber

DQ score: Monday: 26.  Tuesday: 26.  Wednesday: 21. Thursday: 24.  Friday: 25. Saturday: 8.  Sunday: 21.  Average comes out to approximately 21.5 (out of 32).

Overall… better.  The scale is still punishing me for my transgressions over the last two weeks but so far it’s looking better for this month if I can keep myself out of trouble and build up some momentum.

Because I am a data nut, here’s the averages from the last month.

  • Weight: 187.3
  • Avg cal per day: 2082 calories
  • Avg deficit per day: -820 calories (per fitbit, don’t yet have a month of garmin data)
  • DQ Score: 20.9.  A whole month on average over 20!  Yessss!

All in all, it’s a decent month although the top number is not going anywhere fast.  My goal is to beat these numbers in September and hopefully see some progress. Also, hopefully with a monthly average, I can actually see WHAT it takes to make that first number drop.

Four usuable rooms people.  The dream is alive! (ignore the dust)

I’m seriously proud of what I have been able to accomplish here.

My big goals were:

  • Finish the office to the point where it’s usable (DONE)
  • Paint and put everything in the shed that’s supposed to go in the shed (DONE)
  • Finish the pain cave to the point where it’s usable (DONE)
  • Write 4 first-draft chapters of my book (DONE)
  • Read two non-fiction books: How to Start Up and Daring Greatly (first one DONE, second I’m saving for later)

Other little accomplishments:

  • Got my e-chart set up for my doctors office which took faxing things and calling people and other adulting.
  • Started the inital prepping for our kitchen remodel.
  • Made myself sort of a girl again with plucked eyebrows and a self-pedicure
  • Saw some movies in the theater that I REALLY wanted to catch instead of whining about it later and saw Rob Schneider at the comedy club.
  • Had some friends over for an impromptu smallish game night.
  • Successful camping trip to Wichita Falls!

Whew!  I feel awesome about August considering I crashed into it feeling like a train wreck.  Amazing how marking some big things off my to do list, and making a prioritized list by month completely helped my sanity.

So, it’s September!  New month, new list.  Honestly, after the last few months of chores and getting the house in order, I think we deserve a little reprieve from that stuff.  I was getting close to burning it down so we could start over, y’all.  I’m glad I didn’t, and I’m happy it’s done, but it was a pretty close call.  So, we’re focusing elsewhere for the month.

  • TWO camping trips.  Since we had to cancel our family trip to Port Aransas because… well… it’s kind of not there anymore… (we’ll try again in the spring) we decided to go to Granger Lake instead for a long weekend to unwind.  We’ve both been rather prickly lately with the last month of craziness and three days in the wilderness without to dos, screens, technology, and frankly, much talking, sounds like the cure.  And then, camping for Kerrville… we’re staying two nights just for a sprint race, so most of the trip is also about chilling out and having fun.
  • Office.  Actually using it.  Now that the office is set up, we need to dedicate time to actually working on projects.  Here’s what I’d like to accomplish:
    • Three more chapters in my book.  I’m giving myself a little leeway because I’d like to make some strides in other things (below).  But, if I’m really rolling, I’ll try for one a week again and go for four.
    • Website functionality.  Investigate setting up site subscriptions, and payment options.  I feel like these are the last two things I need to learn to be able to set up a professional looking website.  I may outsource this one to Zliten or at least ask him to help me.
    • Side Gig Plan.  Start thinking about in what manner I would trade little green scraps of paper for things that I do.  What services would I provide?  What are appropriate prices?  What can I offer that can make me passive income (like stock training plans)?  What am I willing to do actively (like coaching a client one on one)?

Other stuff:

  • Dr. Appointment to drain my ears.  I’m not doing overtime anymore, so it’s not quite as annoying to get there during business hours and it would be nice to know if my ears are super plugged or my husband just mumbles a lot.
  • Two more Non-Fiction books.  One triathlon or memoirs type non-fiction book, and one about business/marketing/etc.  I haven’t picked them out yet – any suggestions? Hit me up in the comments.
  • Wills.  This should be fairly easy and cheap to set up online and then my parents will stop bugging me about them.  Also, it’s a good thing to do because I do ride my bike and dive 50 feet underwater and swim in lakes where people beat me up while I’m trying not to drown and I also abide by the 5 second rule liberally so it’s not as if I completely avoid risks in life.

I have a lot of other fun stuff planned too, like hosting game night, going to two others, celebrating some birthdays, and all sorts of other things I’m forgetting right now!

This week’s to do list:

  • Try to nail down our kitchen remodel and give someone green papers in exchange for it.
  • Identify the 2-3 non fiction books I want to read this month and buy them.  I’ll have a decent amount of reading time on the camping trip so I hope to have them queued up and ready to go!
  • Chapter 5.  It’s started, but just barely (about 1k words)  Finish it and start the next if there’s time.  Spend some time doing this in the woods!
  • Camping!  This will be trip #3 in the pop up.  Hopefully this one will be easier to pack for and less stressful.
  • Wills.  Zliten has already started to look into this, perhaps we can get this one taken care of!

I’m hoping to get all this done, but it may be ambitious with camping.  We’ll see!

PSA: If you’re looking for a way to help with the craziness happening in the Houston area, we sent some supplies on Amazon.  I liked this option because I know 100% of what I paid for this went directly to something that was needed in shelters.  Consider this option if you have a few $$ to toss their way and don’t know what to do.

Not-quite-so-hotter’n Hell 100

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On August 29, 2017

In Uncategorized

The heat is my KRYPTONITE.

I tend to die a quick and early death when it’s super hot.  So, it makes sense that my choice for a ride this summer was Hotter’n Hell 100, in late August in Wichita Falls, TX, where the temperatures can climb to 105+, right?  I knew it was a stupid idea, so I did stupid things like ride outside for 3 hours at 5pm on the hottest day of the year in feels-like-110 temps and bike commute two days a week in the heat for the last month to prepare.

Then came hurricane Harvey last week.  The devastation in the Houston/Galveston area is terrible, and I would not have wished that on anyone for any reason.  However, a teeny silver lining, the effects up north made for some really unseasonably cool and still dry temperate weather.

We stayed up too late on Thursday night because we are dumb and I have determined that we need an adult sometimes to tell us to go to bed.  Friday morning, we finished final packing and drove our Turtle Home to work for a half day.  Showing off the trailer to a coworker, we realized that we had a tire about 10 miles away from blowing out (ack!), so we took time to fix that and got on the road later than expected.  We stayed just a little ahead of the storm the entire time and found Wichita Falls a little wet but sunny!

We didn’t get into town until after 6pm, got a little lost trying to find packet pickup (but got to see some awesome fast boys crit racing which was exciting!), and then by the time we got camp set up and cooked a very quick dinner it was after 9pm.  After falling asleep around 10, our propane leak sensor starting wailing at midnight.  We fixed it pretty quickly, but… crap.  Two pre-race nights full of sleep fail.  Not optimal.

Let me step in here and give a shout out to the KOA campgrounds in Burkburnet, TX.  They. were. awesome.  They offered free shuttles to the race… which was 14 miles and a few towns away.  Instead of stressing about parking (and with 12,000 people racing, I’m sure that would have been a NIGHTMARE), they dropped us off at about 6:30 AM (45 mins before the race) a block away from our corral and gave us a number to call to be picked up whatever time we finished, bikes and all.  They were all also super nice and it was family owned and the vibe felt good.  If I do this race again, I would ABSOLUTELY stay there.

12,000 people with bikes looks about what you would expect it to – we swarmed this downtown area.  I have never seen or experienced anything like it.  I was terrified of that many people that close together with bikes, but they know what they’re doing with the start.  I was able to get across the line with minimal space invasion and freaking out.

The first 10 felt easy, but I had to stop at the first aid station.  Normally I would hate to stop so early, but I felt like I couldn’t drink because I had to peeee, and not hydrating could have been a HUGE problem later.  There was a  HUGE porta potty line, but it was necessary, so I waited.  After that, I consumed some redbull and some fruit and then we got back on the road and I could drink again had a gel and life was good.

We met a guy who used to work for REI and we spent about 10 miles talking about Novara bikes and the store and all sorts of other randomness.  The temperatures were cool and apparently I was overhydrating, I had to stop again for the second aid station potties.  I think I waited for about 20 mins that time.  Sigh.  In my face went more redbull, watermelon, and a bunch of cookies.  The bottles were filled, we let the cookie monster jersey people know that this was their aid station because they had cookies, and we rolled out again.

In the 30s, riding started to feel a little tedious.  This is my least favorite part of any long ride – when you have enough miles down where you feel like you’ve ridden bikes (achy arms and hands for me before anything else), but you’re not even halfway yet.  Mentally, I felt like I was starting to slip, and we had turned directly into the wind, so I asked my husband if we could take turns every mile or so pulling.  He agreed that it was a better idea than riding side by side so we did that.

That made all the mental difference for me.  I had something to count down to, and  alternated the effort of pulling (harder) and recovering (easier) was better for me than riding a flat pace.  I felt so (hahaha) pro actually coordinating our efforts to conserve energy vs just riding.  We skipped the next but hit the fourth aid station around 40 miles with a little more of a quickness.  Pee, stuff face with PBJs, fill bottles, and hop back on.

At this point, my pulls started to pull away from my husband.  Something wasn’t completely right but I figured he was just having a moment and he’d be pulling me later.

To do the full hundred miles, you have to get to Hell’s Gate (mile 60) by 12:30pm.  We laughed about this earlier and said no problem.  Well, we started calculating times and it was looking like it was starting to become a potential problem, not because of our riding pace (over 15 mph at that point), but our really long stops.  There was debate at that point whether it was at 60 or 62 or 66, so we picked up the pace a little to make sure we didn’t get diverted.

We passed by the next aid station to stop instead at camp, since our route went DIRECTLY by it.  It was our quickest stop yet, hitting a real bathroom with no line, eating some chips, putting some gatorade in our bottles, grabbing some 303s, and we got in and out and on with our lives in about 7 minutes.

Zliten seemed refreshed after the break and feeling better, and we turned away from the wind, so we enjoyed riding side by side a bit again.  Sadly, mile 59 had the aid station I was looking most forward to – bbq sliders (real food!) – but we had 20 minutes to make Hell’s Gate, so we stopped for some cliff blocks instead and put in one more good effort to gain insurance if the gate was more like 66 than 60.

And then, it was indeed mile 60, and we were through with 15 minutes to spare.  My husband let me know that riding that effort definitely burned a match for him and he needed to slow a little.  We started comparing heart rates – he was in the 160s and spiked into 180s and I’d hear him panting and complaining about the heat (it did reach 90 and sunny but still…) while I was leisurely pedaling with a 130-140 heart rate and feeling fine while pulling.  I wasn’t going to leave him, but the slower pace was KILLING ME.

When we got to the 70 mile aid station, I told him that we were stopping, and for a good while, until he felt better.  We sat under mister tents for at least half an hour.  The guy next to us was taking a nap.  I ate probably a jar of pickles and a power bar and some fruit.  Nothing at the aid station was either palatable or wouldn’t cause an allergic reaction for Zliten so I went and grabbed him some blocks out of his bike bento box and gave him some of my gels because he had left his on the table in the camper.

We started out and got a mile before he went to take his turn to pull and just immediately stopped pedaling and started wincing in pain.  I had to block a bunch of cyclists that were drafting off us from running him over as he pulled over to the side.  We waited for the cramp to pass and I said, “look – we’ll go whatever pace we need to finish and if we have to stop and stretch every mile, so be it.”  I don’t know who this person is who was so rational and kind and positive 70 miles into a bike ride, but I’m thankful that was the version of me that showed up that day.

I’m also thankful that we didn’t have to get off the bike that often.  We took turns pulling, me for 2 miles, him for 1 mile, and got to the next aid station.  We almost didn’t stop, but we pulled in to top off the bottles and heard tell of hot dogs, and sure enough… real food he could eat (and FRITOS, which *I* pigged out on).  Later, he said it tasted so good he almost cried while eating it.  We thanked those volunteers profusely and then headed back out fairly quickly.

Another mile out… and another cramp.  Same deal, block my husband from getting run over by wheel suckers, stop, let it pass, and then get going slowly.  I didn’t have one damn person besides Zliten pull for me but I was constantly trailing between 3-7 people who never took a turn at the front.  One mile before the next stop, another really bad cramp hit him in a different spot and he got off the bike and sat down on the side of the road and I had to talk him out of sagging out.  At 89 miles.  With 11 to go.

I convinced him to get to the next aid station, a mile up ahead, and figure it out from there.  There was an ice bath, which may or may not have helped him, but it was something to do.  There was an annoying kid that kept throwing ice at us, but it was late in the day and he was probably super bored so I cut him some slack.  Zliten said he was going to medical but instead he just sat down for a bit until he was prepared to tackle the last few miles.

We took it really slowly the rest of the way.  It wasn’t windy anymore, so I just let him pull so he could pace us to his comfort.  It worked until about mile 99, riding up an overpass, which he ended up doing with one leg while the other was cramping, and we pulled over one more time to wait it out before we made the final descent into the downtown and through the arch at about 4:45pm.  7:16 riding time, 9:20-ish total with ALL the stops.

Here’s probably my second complaint about this ride – at the finish, there was no water, there was one booth handing out cups of coke or sprite but no gatorade, the beer tent was closed, and all the food cost money.  They hyped the finish line village and said it was open until 6pm, but nowhere on the website did it say that there wasn’t any thing freely available for athletes.  We drank our sprites and called the KOA people for the ride, and we were so thankful they were there to shuttle us to Turtle Home instead of driving.

After a shower and getting changed and shoving about half a bag of popcorn and some strawberry cake in my face and using the recovery boots, I felt pretty great!  We grilled up chicken, potatoes, corn, and had some pre-made salads for dinner, which is incredibly healthy compared to the normal gluttony that would ensue after burning about 4000 calories riding bikes.  We sipped our beers (and a flask of fireball) and relaxed and watched a beautiful sunset.

While this is already “longer’n hell”, I liked the race enough that I would consider going back if it fit into my plans (doing a back to back 100 mile ride/13.1 mile trail run would be EXCELLENT Cozumel training next year).  So, here are things I learned and what I’d do differently next time.

  • I’m stingy with my PTO usage but it would have been worth it to take a quarter day Thursday and a full day Friday and stay an extra night.  It would have been amazing to have an extra day Friday to relax, leisurely pick up the packets, hit the pool, watch the crit racing, etc.  Only two days camping made it feel rushed.
  • CHECK YOUR BIKE AT EVERY STOP.  Zliten’s front tire pressure the next day was under 40 PSI (and it’s supposed to be about 100-110).  While I don’t know if it was the entire problem, it can’t have helped to have a under-inflated tire.
  • I would totally stay at this KOA campground next time.  The free shuttle to and from the race was awesome.  It was convenient to have access to it at mile 56 as our own “aid station” and it was wayyyy cheaper than a hotel.
  • I’m usually the one that effs up my nutrition, but I’ve been training myself to be a hoover on the bike and fueling with burgers, fries, pizza, etc.  I can now ride at a sub-maximal effort fueling on damn near anything.  I went back and tracked and I am estimating that I ate/drank over 2000 calories on the ride and had ZERO stomach issues.  I’m going to look into some portable food options that work for both of us that can supplement gels and provide something savory.  And I’m going to start trying to train Zliten to eat pickles on the ride.  I’m pretty convinced the jar or two I ate over the course of the race saved my life.
  • Having a pulling rotation was actually pretty great.  I thought it would feel more like work than a fun bike ride (which, really, was the intention for this one, I had no pace goals).  It helped with the mental management of everything.
  • A pocket sized sunscreen.  Because after the ride, my face matched my drink.

Overall, I’m really thrilled with this ride.  My legs seem to handle about 80 miles before they start to complain, and I would put their decibel level at the end of the race as politely protesting instead of screaming bloody murder.  I’m excited to see what potentially cooler weather and two more months of riding will do, especially because we need to be faster than this (our riding time is fine, just less than the ridiculous 2+ hours of stops) to make the 8h30m cutoff for Livestrong 100.

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Coming ’round the bend

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On August 21, 2017

In Uncategorized

It’s the little things and a few moments in time and measurements in fractions of inches that are going the right way that give me hope that maybe my crazy plans are actually working.

It’s exhausting work chasing this guy down….

Saturday, we did a slightly longer version of our Pain Cave brick workout from last week.  20 mins warmup, 6x 5 mins steady on the trainer/.25 mile on the treadmill at somewhere around 5k speed, 15 mins cooldown.

I can tell you how things didn’t go as planned that day.  I was tired and didn’t set an alarm and woke up after TEN AM.  The treadmill crashed down off the two by four it was propped on and scared the ever living crap out of me on the second interval. I’m still getting used to my husband on the treadmill about four inches from my face when I’m on the bike.

However, I can tell you sometime about interval four I felt my legs start to do the sling shot thing.  Instead of taking effort to move my gams from being extended behind my body to bent in front, at that particular pace and time, it was happening via momentum.  Not every time, and especially when I was just trying not to fly off the treadmill into all the hazards elsewhere in the room, but one part of fixing my stride clicked for the first time… at least in years, before I knew what good or bad running stride was, and maybe ever.

I logged 3.5 miles last week at an average pace of about 9:20/mile.  I’m starting to see dividends in my stride and hopefully this continues.

Also, I lived one of my worst biking fears on Wednesday and it wasn’t that bad.  I totally misinterpreted the world and instead of staying put when an ambulance was coming through a busy intersection, I clipped in and started to go.  Once I realized what was going on, I fumbled and didn’t get unclipped in time and went down RIGHT into the righthand turn lane from the lane heading straight.   It was not the nicest commute in the world but my big girl pants were firmly on, so I got up, rode to work the rest of the way, and rode home.  I’ll probably be a little more cautious on the bike for a bit because I am skittish, but I think I will survive.

Other than that, it was a great week, I hit everything I planned to do.

  • 2 swims
  • 2 bike commutes
  • 1 run off the bike
  • 1 brick workout
  • 2 weights

7.25 hours total.  One key was that I hit the swims in the morning.  We’ll see about changing that up once my schedule clears up a little, but once I’m heading home, it’s REALLY hard to motivate myself to take that detour to the pool.

This week is pretty mellow until Saturday, the ride I have been training for, Hotter’n’Hell 100.

  • 1 swim (DONE)
  • 2 weights (with my NEW PLAN)
  • 1 run off the bike
  • 2 bike commutes OR one bike commute and one morning ride (depending on how time crunched/tired we are).

…and obviously riding bikes for 100 miles on Saturday.  I expect it will take us somewhere between 6-7 hours of riding time, and we’ll have 4-5 hours of training on Mon-Tues-Wed and then two days off to rest up.

It’s weird to have a goal “race” that’s not really a race, but just sort of a morning/afternoon party on bikes, but after all the super serious Ironman prep earlier this year, I’m so so so so so good for it!

The iguana and I had very similar dinners that day… we’re both on #teamlotsofveggies

Here we go.  Numbers and stuff…

  • Weight: 185.3 (-2.1) lbs
  • Avg cal per day: 1967(-191) calories
  • Avg deficit per day: -821 (+102) calories/Garmin (538)
  • Macros: 67 (-13)g fat, 190 (-29)g carbs, 106 (-1)g protein, 25(-7)g fiber

Alright, alright, alright.  Finally some progress.  It’s always darkest before the dawn, I guess.  Obviously, there’s still room to be better, I actually overate on Saturday, not just my -1000 calories in fitbit, but my actual calorie burn +200 or so, but throughout the week it evened out.

Just for funsies, I’m going to put the garmin stats on here as well.  As you can see, it’s a difference of about 300 each day, so while on Fitbit, it looks like I should be losing almost 2 lbs per week, on Garmin, it’s got me right around the 1 lb mark.  Hopefully averaging these out over the next month paired with my average weight loss, I can decide which one seems more accurate in the long term.

So, how about quality?

DQ score: Monday: 28.  Tuesday: 25.  Wednesday: 18. Thursday: 30.  Friday: 27. Saturday: 6.  Sunday: 20.  Average comes out to approximately 22 (out of 32).

I’m going to guess that this, the low 20s, is the approximate DQ threshold where I start to lose weight (as long as my calories are in line as well).  I’ve cut out a lot of the negatives (switching refined grains for whole the majority of the time, eating fruits and nuts instead of other snacks, really thinking about sweets or fried food) and working on adding the positives (getting my required 4 servings of veg per day).

I suppose the despair last week and the relief this week is finding something that works that I can also live with.  Yes, I’m pretty certain that giving up all “negative points” foods and alcohol and I would lose weight.  I could probably do that for a couple weeks (while being a shut in) before I rebelled and went on the biggest battered-fried-dipped-in-ranch-frosted food bender with a bottle of whiskey.  I do moderation much better than abstinence.

I’m aware that I can’t indulge every time there is a reason to indulge and get to race weight.  I’ve passed up work pizza and cake this month.  I’ve stuck… reasonably well to the alcohol in moderation thing.  I’ve gotten comfortable with my weaknesses and starting purchasing pre-made salads to bolster my weekend veg content, making healthy deserts that include sunbutter to get some nut action (heh, heh), and keeping more accessible fruits around so it’s just grab, wash, and go.  The sugar cravings are MOSTLY held at bay with energy balls and some dark chocolate on occasion.  Oven fries, garlic pistachios, and popcorn are almost as good as fried fries and chips.

So, let’s say I find the balance and it’s indeed that 1 lb per week.  That’s about 30 weeks until I hit my goal.  Give or take a few weeks for holidays/vacations where maintaining is just fine, thanks, and I’ll be at my raceweight for my 39th birthday.  That would be a heck of a gift to myself, especially if I can do it while still stopping for a beer on the way home from bike commuting on Wednesdays as long as I also don’t eat the fried pepperoni pizza eggrolls from the food truck outside.

Yes, I used this picture before.  Imagine it just as dusty, but the bookshelf organized and the rest of the room you can’t see in serviceable shape!

THE OFFICE IS DONE, Y’ALL!

I didn’t actually take a picture of it because, honestly, it doesn’t look impressive.  When I gave up perfect for good enough, it meant there’s still crap on the shelves in the corner and there’s still a table with stuff on it and four monitors underneath and I still need to hang some degrees and certificates.  But, it meets all the criteria.  Everything has a place and the things that were elsewhere in the house that were supposed to go there are in there.  The closets close.  The floors are clear.  Most importantly, the desks are clear and we have workspace.

I am proclaiming it done, and for the first time in many, many years (maybe since we moved in), we have four usable rooms with a purpose.  This means, as I have promised my husband, that we are taking the entirety of September off house projects (while we gear up for the kitchen remodel).

I’m really proud of the fact that I’ve been able to sit down, write, and have it flow.  I’ve got the rough draft of three chapters written.  About 16k words.  I’m not so naive that I think it will continue like this forever, and I’m not entirely sure what I’ll think of it once it is done, but I’m writing a book.  I’m about a quarter done.  Even if it’s a big pile of dog mess at the end, I’ll have done it.  And I’ll know what to do better next time.  If I can write a crappy book in three months I can write a not-as-crappy book in another three months and then maybe a decent book in three MORE months and by the time a year is up, I have a shit ton of words and maybe something worth publicizing.

Other stuff I did or didn’t do:

  • Put together my weights plan – YEP!
  • Go shopping – NOPE!  I planned to ride my bike but it was literally feels like 110 when I was set to ride up so I took a nap (heat is EXHAUSTING) and we took an Uber instead.
  • Download a new non-fiction book – KINDA.  I’ve got the preview.  I’m going to decide whether it’s worth 15 bucks to me, but if it is I’m going to do it.  It’s just a little more than a movie ticket and will occupy my time longer.  I want people to pay me as an author, so I shouldn’t flinch about the price of a book I actually want to read, right?

And now, it’s a new week.  What’s up?

  • Racing HHH100 and camping this weekend.  Do all the things to prepare, and go have fun!
  • Finish chapter four of my book.  This is potentially dicey due to it being a short week filled with out-of-town prep, but I’m going to go for it.  Hopefully, it flows and I can at least make some progress.
  • Decide on the book and either download it or pick something else off my list (and read, obvs).

And, on that note, off to do the things that make the stuff go!

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Jack’s Generic Sprint Tri – All I do is pass pass pass no matter what…

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On August 8, 2017

In Uncategorized

Three and a half months after IM day, my body is finally starting to feel like it’s ready to do just a *little* more than play triathlon.

But just a little.

At first I had no expectations, and figured it would just be a repeat of the lack-of-fitness-show in June.  Then, this week, I was able to hold some 8s on my garmin for just a little while on a run, and my brain clicked over to perhaps believing that there was maybe possibly something in there.  But still, no expectations.  Because half a mile at 8:24 and 3 miles on gravel after killing it for 40 minutes on the bike are definitely different animals.

I pretty much did the normal stuff the day before.  Panera for lunch, a movie (Valerian – it’s super fun – go!), a pre-race swim, packet pickup, and then we picked up meats from Stubbs for dinner to go with mashed potatoes and veggies. We also received a couple of packages from some custom hat manufacturers that we’d bought some hats from. We were on our feet a *little* more than we would for a B or A race and finished up some chores so we could completely relax after the race.

Saturday was an awesome day and also it enabled us to completely slack on Sunday after the race without feeling guilty about it.  Win!

I didn’t sleep amazingly – fell asleep around 10-10:30, and woke up from about 12:30-1:30 for absolutely no reason.  5am came pretty early but after some green tea and peppy music, I felt pretty great.

We got to the venue a little later than expected and ended up parking at the end of Egypt, but luckily we had our handy dandy cart to haul our gear and BSS had a team tent at which to drop off our non-transition stuff.  We did the quick version of setting up transitions, skipped the warmup run due to time (would have had plenty of time if I had a second pair of shoes, which would have been NO problem with the team tent, I’ll remember that next time).  We hit the porta potties and missed the 3 minute window for the warmup swim.  0 for 2 on warmups.  Oh well.  I probably walked a few miles that morning, and that’s plenty fine for me.

After cheering EVERYONE ELSE into the water, I lined up with the caps that were my color.  I thought I was in the first third, but after people filtered in from the sides, I was probably bringing up the last third.  D’oh.  Also, as it was my turn to go, I realized I didn’t have my watch set for multisport, so I ducked behind a few more people and got it set up and then I was running into the water like I was on the set of Baywatch and my race started!

Swim:

My lack of paying attention screwed me here.  I ended up running into the water and passing people before I even started swimming.  Then, it was just like body body body bodies everywhere.  And a lot of them were either not swimming even remotely fast or breast stroking or side crawling.  Yes, it was totally my fault for not having confidence in my swimming abilities and also not paying enough attention to the lineup, but it sucked to be dodging people doing the backstroke before the first orange buoy.

Once things cleared up a bit, I felt like I was doing alright, just about like I had at Lake Pflugerville, but I looked at my watch about 2/3 through and it was 8 minutes in.  Not great, but I was finally going with the current so I didn’t worry about it.  Then, I got caught behind a gaggle of really slow swimmers near the exit chute and I was actually literally stopped for a while waiting for people to move.  That sucked, but there was no way around except REALLY wide or over people, and I’m just not that much of an asshole.  I took it as some time to breathe and rest, but it really did tank my swim time/pace.

Not my absolute worst here but definitely sucks that I was a full TWO MINUTES slower than last year.  For the record, my garmin registered almost 600 yards, which is 2:15/100m which is more like what I felt like I was swimming.  Seeing how much I had to dodge people, I’m really going to blame my positioning for most of it but some of it admittedly was fitness.

In summary, I need to have confidence that my swim is better than I think it is relative to other people and also it’s time start doing sets and drills in the pool again.  For realsies.

Swim – 12:34 for 500m – 2:31/100m (17/39 AG place)

T1:

Because I was so… rested coming out of the swim, I actually PR’d my T1 at this race.  At this point I really think the only way I could get much faster here is to improve either my actual running speed or the speed I’m comfortable running barefoot.

T1 – 2:42 (15/39 AG place)

The aftermath.  Barely got down any liquid, but that’s probably ok on a ~40 minute bike.

Bike:

And then I got to the mount line.  And there were literally 20 people crowded there trying to clip in.  My sub-par swim, starting so far back, and being in the last wave had messed up my positioning here too.  I’m not the best clipper-inner, but I’ve been getting better so I confidently walked one step over the mount line on the LEFT side away from everyone, clipped in easily, and then went about dodging everyone else wobbling away down the street.

After the swim, I was not about to get stuck behind people.  I tried not to be a jerk about things, but I had this song in my head by mile .5 (with the lyrics “all I do is PASS PASS PASS no matter what”).  The great thing is that it’s a huge confidence boost to zoom past hundreds of people in the first few miles and get passed maybe 3 times by dudes on the Olympic with 7% body fat on bikes that cost twice what mine does.  The not-so-great thing is that it was due to my placement, not my awesomeness.  The worst is that I spent probably half the first five miles over the double yellow line.  Sorry, but I’m not sorry.  I wasn’t the only one doing it and there was no way around it.

After fighting the wind and crowds, there was a nice tailwind section where my speed climbed and climbed and I saw 20 mph average right as we turned back into the wind up a hill.  I decided I my goal was to keep from losing more than 2 mph as long as I could without spiking my heart rate too much.  We got one more nice tailwind down a hill (wheeee!) and then turned into a wall of wind (ooof).

I got down into aero as teeny tiny as possible, and then found the BIGGEST guy going right about my speed.  I did my best to stay legal on the crowded course, but I’m convinced I still got some drafting benefit even the required 5 lengths behind with his size.  I wasn’t keeping the 19-20 mph I was before but I was holding 16-17, and slightly uphill and into the wind?  I’m happy with that.

My garmin read 18.5 mph average on the actual moving parts once I unclipped and rolled into transition, and I will absolutely take it.  I felt very confident and capable on the bike, even though I’ve only ridden it twice inside since the last race.  Not my best on the course but I think my second best.  One of these days I’ll crack that 20 mph average, but maybe not at Lake Pflugerville for a while with the hills and the wind.

Bike: 42:45 –  18.1 mph (7/39 AG place)

T2:

Luckily, it was not as crowded on the way back into T2.  I did my thing with the quickness and was out on the run with no fumbles.  Best here by 6 seconds!

T2: 1:30 – 14/39

Run:

I got out and running and… while it felt terrible it didn’t quite feel as terrible as last time.  I didn’t want to concentrate on pace, I just wanted to concentrate on quick feet, like my really great run on Friday, so I switched my watch to my cadence and heart rate screen.  It stayed at 176 (88 cadence) and 172 HR and I just could not shove it up any more. So that’s where we lived.

The first mile ticked off at 10:53, and while that in and of itself was not terribly impressive, it was about a minute faster than the first mile six weeks ago and my legs felt significantly less like lead bricks.  Someone in my age group passed me and I considered trying to go with her, but she was moving VERY quickly and I just didn’t see it happening.  Yet.  Maybe by Kerrville I’ll have the mojo to run someone down again.

The second mile was about the same as the first and then all of a sudden we hit the wall of wind.  Again, just like the last race, I felt I was running standing still, but with signficiantly better stride.  I knew the wind was rough when my last mile was the slowest paced.  My garmin showed the course SIGNIFICANTLY short, but my Garmin also has a habit of sandbagging me, so I’ll say while this definitely was slower than 9:58/mile pace, it probably wasn’t the 10:56/mile my watch showed.

Run – 29:55 – 9:58/mile (20/39 AG placement)

One day we’ll get a full team picture.  This was not that day.  Photo care of team captian Claudia!

Total time: 1:29:29.  (10/39 AG placement)

Here’s the skinny.  If you want to bump up your placement, get better at the bike.  The average of 20+15+7 is certainly not 10 but since I did well on the bike, that’s where I placed.

Also, there was some majorly stiff competition.  I would have needed to place 10th OVERALL of 186 women to snag third in my age group.  I placed 43rd, so top quarter, at least!   I was in the top half overall both genders.  Oddly enough, if I would have stepped up and did the Olympic, I’m pretty sure I would have snagged 3rd out of 5th in my age group, from times that I’ve posted recently.  Ah well.  No regerts, right?

I’m definitely not back at peak form but I’m showing improvement.  And that’s what’s important.  I’m going to stick with my bike focus, because it seems to be both improving my bike and also improving my overall endurance without all the pounding of running.  I’m also sticking with playing Dance Dance Revolution plyometrics because it seems to be helping my running form.

Obvs, these guys do not need the plyometrics because they have the HOPS and also they both had pretty great days!

While I’d like to actually run more, I think it may actually be helpful to run less and let my legs forget the marathon shuffle.   I have run almost nothing (about 22 miles) in the last six weeks, but I improved my run by over 2.5 minutes on the same course.  And, swimming.  I have no idea why I’m not into it right now, but one sport has to be the red headed stepchild, and I’m sorry, swimming, you’re it.  I really do need to focus a bit better when I do get to the pool, but at this point, I’m going to ride bikes and hope for the best.

Super thanks to all my Bicycle Sport Shop teammates, it’s always a blast to race with you!  I mostly signed up for this race because FOMO, and had a pretty solid day.

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About Me

I'm a video game producer and a lover of anything game related by trade.  I'm a triathlete by hobby.  I live for being on or in the water as much as I can - scuba diving, snorkeling, paddleboarding, water slides... you name it.  The dichotomy between my outdoor and indoor realities are interesting, but they're all mine!  Longer version here...

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