Adjusted Reality

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

Tag: offseason Page 10 of 15

Recovery

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On November 7, 2016

In Uncategorized

Last week was all about recovery and doing all those things you don’t get to do on busy training weeks.  I read and napped in my hammock for an afternoon.  We spent almost the entire weekend playing video games.  I ate and drank some things I generally wouldn’t touch.  It was glorious!

nov7-2

Day after the race?  Tons of hammock and beer repeats.  I still may have been caffeinated at that point.

Physical recovery:

I’m going to give props to both my new boots and all the weight training I did this cycle.  While I was not ready to go out and do it all again the next day or anything, I had very little muscular issues in the days following the race.  I wasn’t toilet sore, I didn’t have issues with stairs, I would say if I *had* to, I was ready to go for an easy jog by Tuesday, or definitely Wednesday.

However, as it’s been manifesting lately after races, I was this weird unreasonable amount of the *tireds* for days.  It took me three days to finish the laundry because it was a herculean effort to do that.  The rest of the stinky triathlon crap stayed all around the house until SATURDAY.  I expended my last ounces of *give a shit* at the race and was fresh out for the week, and that’s TOTALLY fine.

We rode bikes with the BSS crew on Wednesday, and while I started the ride wondering why I was taking precious time away from sitting on my couch and eating food, the ride itself was great.  My legs certainly did not feel snappy, but it was nothing unlike how things felt during peak weeks.  I felt better after and I continue to feel pretty good since.

nov7-1

Vidja games.  All weekend.  Looking like VR dorks.

Mental recovery:

Having a good (but not perfect) race is interesting.  Mentally, I am READY TO GO but I know if I jump back in 100% right now, I’m going to arrive at Ironman in April weak and burnt out. I need some of that time to lift heavy things without caring how sore it makes me, and time to play bikes, running, and swimming.

Y’know, those kind of workouts where you plan a 6 hour trainer movie marathon on a shitty weather day where you order delivery pizza in the middle or do the Tour De Donut instead of a serious long ride.  Or you head out the door with your shoes on and run somewhere between 3 and 17 miles without a planned route at whatever pace your feet carry you and maybe there’s a stop at the swing set in the park in the middle.  Or you see how many laps you can do in the lake before your arms fall off while it’s the perfect wetsuit weather for a little while longer.  And also, sometimes these plans will fuck right off for laying in my hammock reading or the right happy hour invitation.

Adventures and activity, rather than checking boxes.  That’s the goal for a while.

My plan was to take the next 2 months and allow myself to train according to feel.  I’m sticking to it.  At this point, I expect I’ll do enough long stuff to keep myself in enough shape to kick off a for-real training plan in the new year.  12 weeks + taper is a REALLY long time for me to follow anything strict, and I need to go in hungry for it.

So, basically, I’m really excited about the next cycle, and I need to make sure I save my eager self from myself by sticking to the plan.  I’ve done that gung ho thing before and it doesn’t end well.

nov7-3

Chicken Fettuccine Alfredo.  The LIGHT version is 800+ calories.  I made up for that fact with housing two bread baskets.

Gustatory Recovery:

I haven’t been going hungry.  Let’s just state the obvious.  I know the FIRST rule of recovery… and actually most things triathlon… is to shove food in my mouth when I’m hungry.  I have not failed to do that (and have probably succeeded a little too well, but that’s ok).  If I was a better person, it would have been all the veggies, fruits, whole grains, lean protein, etc.  However, the words second dessert, alcoholic, and fried have definitely been in my vocabulary.

I’m pretty sure I’ve gotten the bulk of it out of my system, and by Friday, I was already at odds – I was totally ready mentally to start eating less food after a few days, but my appetite was like “nope, we’re going to eat this ENTIRE giant veggie sandwich and chili in the matter of 3 minutes and then we’re going to rumble a few hours later”.  Well then.

I operate on a normal ratio of about 80% healthy, 20% splurge.  The ratio was reversed last week.  Back to the norm this week.  There is NO possible way that I’ve actually gained the 4 lbs the scale says in one week, so it’s time to shift the balance of what I’m made of from bourbon and french fries to salads and coconut water.

nov7-4

After riding my bike for 90 minutes at 12 mph, I made sure to eat enough fried food to outweigh the health benefits.  Whew!  Almost did something crazy on rest week.

What’s next?

This week is a gentle emergence from hedonism.  The dish of leftover Halloween candy isn’t getting thrown out or anything, but knowing that it has to be tracked and balanced with the rest of my intake should keep me from raiding it excessively.

Mid Season Break Week 1:

  • Two heavy lifting sessions.  These are the most important sessions of the week.
  • Two bike rides, two runs, one swim if it works out.  Nothing with any effort besides the runs, and that’s if I feel up to it.
  • Tracking the food again.  No judgies on the amount because my appetite will still be coming down, but we need to quantify it again.
  • 10k steps per day.  I don’t care if I hit any training, but I need a baseline of activity.
  • Five fruits and veggies servings per day.  This tends to keep the rest of my day on track.
  • Absolutely no writing up training plans for next year even though I’m super excited to do it.
  • Check some stuff off the big “do this stuff once season’s over” list.

It’s Monday.  Let’s do this thing (and today, that thing is weights and a nice long walk)!

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#projectspring wrap up

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On July 15, 2016

In Uncategorized

Today marks 4 months from the start of #projectspring, and the official end of the time I had allotted for a break from being an athlete.

Apr4-4

Overall, I cannot stress enough how transformative and refreshing this season of being a human person was.  I knew I was mentally burnt out and I needed some time to heal my poor little broken pysche.  I knew I was physically weak and needed some time to stop rubbing salt in my hip injury by running on it and just stay off of it for WAY longer than I wanted to admit.  I knew I needed some time off to focus on other things in my life that had been back burner-ed because they were starting to really bug me, but I didn’t have the time or attention or the fucks to give while training.

What I didn’t know is that I needed some time to… change.  Evolve.  Spin life a different way.  I could barely see my way out of never being enthusiastic about a thing again in March.  I had no idea it was time to start a whole lot of fairly dramatic shifts in my life.

I set out with a rather large to do list, and I’m happy to say that I’ve made a whole lot of progress.  Can I check everything off the list? Not a chance.  The best laid plans go astray, and sometimes priorities change in the middle of the road.  However, now that I really and truly grasp the SPIRIT of what I wanted to accomplish (and I full admit that I DID NOT when I started this process), and I’m going to say that it was a big success.

Mar30-2

March was really about shedding fatigue, getting my mojo back and establishing some habits (-1000 calories less than I burn per day, 10k steps per day, tracked by fitbit).  If you were to go back and reread my posts from earlier in the year and then compare them with these, my attitude is night and day different.  I didn’t feel like myself through the winter.  Now, I’m back to being the happy, optimistic, dare I say even PEPPY person again instead of feeling like I’m dragging myself around through life.  Camping helped – weekends without to dos, cell phone reception, and just QUIET really helped me calm the fuck down.  I also successfully navigated myself through a 10 mile running race, thoroughly enjoying myself with a significant personal worst.

The second month was about starting things.  In April, I started started tackling the to do list in earnest, starting with the easier stuff.  I forgave my bike and started riding it again, and went camping, and started a weights program, and even ran maybe once or twice for funsies.  I revamped my website, I edited my diving photos, I organized some parts of my house.  I got a hammock and started enjoying my yard (until the heat and the bugs killed that dream), I paddled on the lake a lot and in the lake a little. This is also the month where my body FINALLY started getting the memo that we were going to start losing some weight.  Slowly.

May23-3

May changed me.  First of all, I got this crazy (for me) short haircut.  At first it terrified me, but then I came to love it.  It was almost as if all the dead weight in my hair fell away and I felt… freer.  I went on vacation and came back to find my company had made a lot of changes.  This shocked me into really pondering what I want to be when I grow up and reminded me that stagnation is death of the soul, and diversifying yourself as a person is an important thing.  I also started my journey to bike love this month, and found out that commuting via two wheels is THE BEST.

June held a triathlon, my first race in 2.5 months, where I found that my fitness was not all that bad for slacking for months.  A refreshed psyche actually makes up for a lack of training pretty well!  I got back to training a little bit, riding lots of bikes, swimming some, continuing the weight training, and running as little as I could justify (because, heat).  We also purchased our very own triathlon bikes, and found that they are a) awesome and b) definitely different and going to take a while to get used to.

June22-3

We wrapped up #projectspring with party camping for the fourth of July, cleaning out the side yard, and here we are.  It’s July 15th – where am I?

I’m 3 weeks into training for Austin 70.3 because it just felt like it was time to start.  I’m a few weeks away from becoming a Certified Personal Trainer and get to start on my Sports Nutrition Specialist and Triathlon Coach certification here soon.  I’m on two wheels every chance I get.  I’ve lost enough weight to say that I’ve completely erased the horrible nutrition experiment of  fall 2015.  I also seem to have found a way of skating the line of fueling myself well enough to train but also slowly inching the number on the scale down.

Most importantly, I feel so far removed from that shell shocked, broken girl who put this post up with a brave face and a lot of hope, but also a lot of fear.  Fear there was something broken mentally and physically that couldn’t be repaired, fear of goals I really wanted to achieve but they were out of reach, fear I’d decide I like sitting on my couch better than doing any of this shit.  Luckily, I found none of those things to be true and I can’t think of too many four month periods where I’ve changed my life more.

May31-1

I like specifics, so let’s go line by line for funsies:

  1. Get my enthusiasm back.  Gosh, I never want to be that much of a zombie again.  Overtraining and burnout is real, yo.  I am so happy to be on the other side of it.  Check, and check.
  2. #projectraceweight.  Well, it was a good attempt. All told, my highest weight was 195.something, and today I weighed in at 182.something on evil white scale.  So at the swingy ends, I lost about 13 lbs in 4 months.  Not *exactly* what I was looking for but at least the scale number went down and I followed the program pretty closely.  I learned a lot.
    1. First of all, there is definitely a level of activity that is not zero in which it’s easiest for me to lose weight.  1200 calories is VERY hard to adhere to and that’s what I get on zero training.  Raising my activity enough to earn some extra food per day but not to the point where my hunger goes crazy is an art and a science, but it was the key.
    2. Even if you make the numbers line up, it won’t always work out.  It took me SIX WEEKS before I saw any sort of meaningful progress being REALLY good.  I just had to keep at it.  Persistence pays off.
    3. For the last seven or so years, my days where I’ll have some drinks is determined by what days I don’t have to get up and train in the morning.  When you don’t have to train in the morning ever, it’s kinda hard to resist Jim Beam’s siren song more often than you should, especially when you’re going through a lot of personal and professional stuff.
    4. 13 lbs doesn’t sound like that much, but it definitely is the difference between hating my appearance most days at the higher weight to liking my appearance most days at the lower one.
    5. I had expected a hard stop on maintaining a deficit when I started training again, but it seems like I’m able to continue at this point of early season.  Tons of people lose weight while training for these things, perhaps I can too.
  3. House projects.  I hate doing this shit, like I REALLY detest and resent the time spent cleaning and organizing, but I love the results.  Can someone just HGTV this stuff for me while I’m away for a few weeks?  That’d be nice.  We got most of the little projects done and specifically held off on the bigger ones until we can determine whether doing it as CHEAP as possible or doing it as QUICKLY as possible is the priority.
    1. Cleaned and organized the workout room.  It still needs some love to become the pain cave, but that involves some creative problem solving with 6 bikes we use on a weekly basis and gear storage until we get the shed.  However, it’s no longer a room full of junk and crap and unusable.  That’s progress.
    2. Cleaned and organized the vanity area.  This one was a pain in the ass, but it seems to be working out alright.  I am SO thrilled not to have crap all over and a place to put everything.  Check.
    3. Cleaned out the guest closet.  There was so much crap there that was completely unnecessary to keep.  Donated it to Goodwill or threw it away.  There’s a lot of room for other things in there now too (or, a guest could use it as a closet, go figure).
    4. BONUS: cleaned out the side yard workshop area.  This wasn’t on the list, but it’s definitely worth mentioning.  There’s still STUFF there, but you can actually walk through without getting caught on 8 year old broken kiddie pools and empty boxes.
    5. The office did NOT get done (or started).  It’s the one project we didn’t get to.  It’s actually on the list to start working on after we finish the personal training class, so I have faith this will not be on the resolution pile in January.
    6. Planning for the big stuff: we got an estimate (though it seemed REALLY scary low) for the kitchen work, we looked at sheds, we’re pricing out the electronics for the pain cave, but we’re in a bit of shell shock with money expenditures with the tri bikes, some unexpected car expenses, paying for vacations this spring, and work bonuses still up in the air.  Maybe we’ll pull the trigger on some of this later in the year, maybe it will wait.
  4. Become a biker chick adept cyclist comfortable on the roads and get a tri bike.  I have been rambling on about this a whole lot, so let’s say check check checkity check and move on.
  5. Website revamp.  I’m super happy with how things turned out.  If I someday need to make a website that makes money or supports a business, I have more to learn.  But for now, I have a clean, reasonably nice looking soapbox to stand on.  That’s all I need for now.
  6. Process my Bonaire Pics.  Yep!  Now, I still need to process my ROATAN pics.  That goes on my to do list for this weekend.
  7. Camping once a month.  Well, we did March, April, and July.  We missed May because of vacation and other commitments and by June it got really hot.  July was only really possible because we were camped on someone’s property with a pool.  I’m looking forward to some more outings in the fall when it starts to cool off!
  8. Spending lots of time in and on the water. Although falling in love with cycling has taken away some of the water time, I’m doing my best to maintain a balance.  Check and check.
  9. Going and DOING THINGS.  To be honest, this just really fell off.  It’s not as if life is boring around here, but I just never prioritized “go downtown for this random festival” over riding bikes or camping or playing in the water, or everything else.
  10. Creativity during downtime.  While I did not do this to the letter, I’m going to change this one over to “learn some new stuff” and call it a win. With the personal training classes, working on my book, and some other super secret squirrel things that are in the dreaming/plotting/scheming stages right now, my time is definitely occupied doing some productive, fun, and learning stuff.

Jul11-4

So now, we move on to the next phase.  Honestly?  I thought there would be much more of a harsh transition.  July 14?  #projectspring.  July 15?  Something completely different.  That’s how I came into this process.  However, I think I just needed the hard stop on the front end because I was kind of miserable and badly needed to change.  I’m kind of the opposite right now, so I think I’ll just continue on with what I’m doing right now, switch a few letters in the hashtag, and call it #projectsummer.

Lake Pflugerville Triathlon

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On June 22, 2016

In Uncategorized

The last few years, I’ve ended offseason with a race.  While I’m not *quite* there yet, this was definitely what you would call a “rust buster” as in I haven’t raced a triathlon in about 9 months, since my disastrous Kerrville Tri cramps-n-crash-n-burn.  It’s always exciting to toe the line (or the beach in this case) with more questions than answers.  How is my base fitness (aka – what’s left after slacking for 3 months)?  How is my mental game?  Am I healed or is there still residual ick in there?  Can I handle my new bike well?  Do I remember how to pee anywhere else besides a porta potty?

June22-3

Spoiler alert: I peed in the lake.

Saturday was an epic family cookout.  Normally, I’d be worried about being on my feet so much, but I am used to the 10k++ steps per day and don’t have a lot of residual fatigue, so it was fine.  I slept well this week, but I slept terribly before the triathlon.  Not for any real reason, I just kept waking up because Zliten was fidgeting (usually I sleep through any of that like a rock) and my book was interesting and I’m not used to an 8:30pm bedtime.

Race morning alarms are what they are, so at 5am, I was up and at ’em.  I had a belvita with some almond butter and grabbed some caff chews for later.  We puttered around all morning, I didn’t get a warmup run but I did get a warmup swim, and I porta pottied like a champ and peed in the lake.  I went from wheee, we’re doing a race… to WHEEEEEEEEEE! RACE!!! over the course of consuming my caff chews, so all was well with the enthusiasm.  I sent Zliten and Matt off to race, cheered them into T1, and then five thousand minutes later, I tucked into my wave and got going.

Jun22-1

I call this one Sunrise over Expensive Bicycles.

Swim:

I sized up my wave and thought… ok… I can take most of these ladies on the swim and bike at least.  I lined up close to the front and found a lane and swam.  I intentionally kept it about 3 gears below redline.  I’m not swim trained right now, and I had no idea how taxing a the full race would be on my endurance at this point in time, and the last thing I wanted to do was blow up.  I concentrated on smooth long strokes, avoiding ALL THE FUCKING PRICKLY PLANTLIFE (and failing), and staying at the decent-effort-but-not-gasping pace.

I’d say I did well.  I ended up getting out of the water 5th in my age group, and besides a slight rookie mistake of not swimming in far enough, I’m happy.  It’s an average time for me for this race, about 15 seconds off my best, and that’s all I can ask for at this moment in time.

Swim: 11:28/500m (it was long – I came out with 600 yards). 5/21 AG

T1:

I navigated the barefoot rocky run with reasonable fearlessness.  My new aero bottle FELL off my bike when I unracked, I fumbled with one of my socks for too long, and my bike was not in the best position in transition (longer run in cleats than normal), but all in all it didn’t suck too, too badly.  I’ve had way worse first transitions of the year.

T1: 2:53

Bike:

leahbike

Coming in smiling on the Death Star, so you know it can’t have gone THAT badly… thank you Pat McCord for photographing us all!

I got out and had some n00b moments with my clips (my new cleats just aren’t playing nice with my pedals, or I’m just bad at clips, or both), and then got going and ahhhhhhh.  When you don’t have to stop or dodge traffic or anything, this bike is like BUTTER.  Pass, pass, pass, pass, pass.  Since I swam well, I only got one or maybe two people in my age group here, but being in one of the last waves means (glass half empty) dodging around EVERYONE and (glass half full) getting the rush of passing so many people.

Everything went well except for a few things.  One – this girl and I were going about the same pace, and I could tell she was a newbie (a very fit newbie but a newbie).  I would try to pass her, get a little ahead, but she would stay on my wheel and not fall back.  Typically, you leapfrog with someone your same pace, they pass you, you recover a bit, pass them back, then later they pass you, etc.  It’s nice.  This was not.

Second – new bike had me all kerfuffled.  I totally forgot how to eat even though I have this sexy aero bento box full of gels.  I meant to take one around halfway and I didn’t.  I thought I drank my full bottle of Scratch because I couldn’t get a sip and I drank less than half.  No matter how I adjust, the aero position hurts my arms (all over this time, not just the delts like when I rode on the trainer) after 10 or so minutes and that was even with playing with all sorts of position changes.

Lastly, the traffic closures were a joke.  There was a good few miles in the middle where the cars were ducking into our lane and forcing the cyclist either on the very edge of a rough country road with lots of potholes and bumps or crusing slowly behind them.  It was a huge buzzkill when all I wanted to do was FLY on the Death Star.  If I was smart, I would have used that time to take a gel but… hindsight is 20/20 and it’s hard to remember to be smart when you’re angry.

I hammered the last few miles in and when I looked at my garmin for the first time, I was actually rocking some really great speed.  I stayed in aero A LOT more than I did on the other bike, and I played with all my shifters, and while my quads and my arms ached, the rest of my legs felt way fresher than normal.

Best bike split on this course ever.  This year of bikes is starting off well and going to be the best!  Fourth in my age group and I was REALLY close to catching third.

Bike: 45:25 (garmin said moving time was 44:48 for 18.8 mph) for 14 miles 4/21 AG

T2:

Everything went according to plan except the jerkhole next to me had racked his bike right on top of my shit (and he had plennnnnnty of room) and my stuff was all in disarray.  Not my best T2 ever because of that, but this is pretty decent considering what I was working with.

T2: 1:42

Run:

Here is where it shows I have not been training.  With the swim and the bike, I don’t lose fitness really quickly and can almost pick up my training right where I leave off.  With the run, if I take more than a week or two off, my running paces significantly fall off and take a while to come back.  I haven’t run much in 3 months.  I knew this, and while I was hoping for magic race day miracles, I was planning for reality.

When I got going, I saw my pace was about 30-60 sec off what I would expect if I was trained.  No big deal.  I ignored it and kept trying to reel people in and keep my head positive.  After a mile, I checked in and yep, pace still the same, effort still feels about what I’d expect racing a sprint tri in the deathly heat (feels like upper 90s at that point), so I switched over to heart rate to monitor that instead.

It was a little on the low side (171), so I worked on shoving it up to where I know I can maintain without redlining (175) and then put on my cruise control.  It was maybe one quarter of a gear harder than I was going previously.  I didn’t have much else to give.  My pain cave is shallow right now.

The run was kind of a blur.  I remember dumping all the water over my head to stay cool and catching Raul about half a mile in and chatting for a sec, and kind of zoning out in the middle watching the little number on my watch, and then switching over to total time near the end and seeing if I could will myself to catch my PR of 1:30:30.  I sped up a little, I passed a few people, and then last year’s time ticked by, and I threw my bottle at Zliten when I saw him because I was done with it and then there was the finish.

Run time: 30:32 for 3 miles (garmin showed it a little short with a 10:29 pace) 9/21 AG

Overall time: 1:32:01, for 5/21 (top quarter) in my age group.  Top 30% of all females.  Solid top half overall because dudes are stupid fast.

June22-4

All done!  Time to go drink beer!

Do I wish I could have pulled out a PR?  Always.   But I had no business expecting it and I’m not disappointed finishing with my second best time in six years completely untrained.  I love the bike PR and how I felt out there.  I’ll take the swim.  I know I have to work for the run and I haven’t been doing that.  I’ve ran 36 miles total since the marathon.  Yes.  My mental game’s on point – I kept my head on my shoulders and didn’t blow up mentally or physically.  I made mistakes in transition (or had them made for me) but I remembered how to do all the things.  All in all, I am THRILLED with the day I had.

What’s next?  One last week of doing whatever, and then we start some actual intentional sessions with some work spiced in.  Nothing drastic, but it starts looking like a training plan instead of a social calendar. My next race is on this course in August, and I’d love to annihilate all my paces here.

Footnote: there’s a reason I’ve been avoiding these hard efforts for months.  Y’all, I was SO HUNGRY. I could not stop eating for 2 days.  If I’m going to try to continue to pursue this #projectraceweight thing a little further, I need to be REALLY smart about what I eat on days when I have long or hard efforts.  

Becoming the storm

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On June 9, 2016

In Uncategorized

Monday, something clicked about one mile into the Monterrey Bay (treadmill course) run.  Studying the bio-mechanics of the body for Personal Training class made me think about extending my hips.  I found that by throwing my legs backward with a little more force to force more extension, I was able to go from 11 minute miles to 9 minute miles with very little extra effort.  It was harder on the hills, and I really had to concentrate on it so I didn’t just dangle my legs like I usually do, but it felt good.  Powerful.  Like the limiter is I need to work on my hamstring strength (totally doable) vs somehow make my lungs not gasp for air sub-10 minute miles with my current form (a lot harder to imagine).

June9-1

If you ride your bike and don’t take a selfie, did you actually ride your bike?

Also, this week, I just feel like I’m ready to fly a little faster.  Tuesday, I had some thinking to do and my bike to ride on country roads.  Let me tell you – after riding in town for months, being able to ride for 10 miles with two stops was BLISS.  I also found an effort, a zenned out thinking pace with legs pumping and breath just on the edge of aerobic, where I was able to generate some decent power and a speed that is decent, dare I say, not completely laughable for a short trip that included the three bitches sisters hills twice.

I’ve seen this quote appearing in my social media feeds a lot lately (I remember it coming from THIS LADY but I’m sure I’ve seen it a few times elsewhere).  Sometimes the universe puts in front of you exactly what you need rolling around in your brain.

Storm

I also love this one as grammar… enthusiast?

Your

But that’s not here nor they’re their there.

I’m at that weird place where I’m no longer hiding inside from the rain.  I’m not yet one with it, but I’m feeling the rain on my skin and thinking… yeah… I want to go there.

So far, the first quarter of thirty seven is either doing or setting myself up to do things that range from slightly intimidating me to holy-shit-this-is-terrifying stuff.  I mean, some of them are little in the grand scheme of things, like riding a bike in traffic or actually digging under the hood and fixing my website without throwing a bunch of money at it, but these are still things I was not willing to tackle even a few months ago because they sounded… hard.

However, there’s bigger stuff.  Some things are uncomfortable, like returning to taking classes while being fully employed and also training for races.  Some things are scary, like actually taking the time off to heal my body and mind this spring and losing ALL THE FITNESS and then plunking down the money to race 140.6 miles next year.  Some things are utterly terrifying, life direction changing, true ventures into the unknown, the kind of thing where even the beginning acts of planning cause both extreme fear and excitement at what could be.

They say every 7 years or so, you go through a big change.  I’d say I was a completely different person on my 30th birthday than I was on my 28th.  New town, 100+ lbs lighter, new job, new priorities.  Unless my crystal ball is completely wrong, I think at age 39, I’ll look back at 37 and go… huh, that was me?  Crazy!

I do well with inertia.  Once I get the ball rolling, I am pretty great at keeping it in motion.  However, I resist change, the start of motion, by digging in my heels and hunkering down where I’m at no matter how bad it is. It can be a boon in endurance sports, but sometimes it’s not so good in life.

fine

For example, the haircut.  I knew it was looking really raggedy.  My long hair was up in a messy bun about 80% of the time.  But it was what I was used to, even if it was ratty and gross, so it stayed until I was practically dragged into the salon chair.

At first the shock of losing about 50% of what was on my head was terrifying.  Within a few days though, I loved it and I had no idea why it had taken me so long to take the plunge.  It’s different, for sure.  It’s harder to put up for workouts, and I cannot go more than two days without washing it or it’s greeeeeasy.  However, I can roll directly from wet to looking really good by the time I get my coffee in the morning without doing anything and that is EVERYTHING to me right now.

Such is life.  Generally, once I make the leap, I’m so happy I did, but getting myself there is such mental gymnastics.  Sometimes it takes the universe (or someone else) smacking you on the head saying “this isn’t fine, as much as you want it to be” and “to resist change and growth means the slow death of your soul”.

A storm is approaching.  The air pressure is just different these days.  Even if I just try to hunker down, I don’t think I can avoid it, I don’t think you can tell the weather to cease to exist.  I can go inside, I can put on a raincoat, I can tolerate the raindrops, but I think the way I really succeed is just to BECOME THE FUCKING STORM.  Embrace the things that are terrifying.  Hold them tight until we know each others innermost fears and desires.  Right now, I need the crazy eyes and the bezerker battle cry.  I need to channel all the volatile, relentless, and brutal energy of the tempest to not only allow the crazy into my life, but chase it down and pin it to the ground.

So, watch out sunshine – this storm is coming.

Life on two wheels

By

On June 6, 2016

In Uncategorized

The #projectspring agenda item of becoming a biker chick adept cyclist loomed out there a little dauntingly for many months.  I definitely procrastinated that in favor of tackling other items that didn’t intimidate me so much first – I knew it was bad when I redesigned my website completely before commuting to work ONCE.  While it was definitely productive procrastination, it’s taken a while to transition to a life (more) on two wheels.

Feb2-2

Earlier this year, she was the only one riding my bike.

First, I forgave my bike for getting in a crash and making the last 6 miles of Kerrville so difficult and making me feel so horrible on the group ride in February.  This sounds stupid, but I actually resented the actual bike for a while.  I don’t remember exactly what day it was that I let it go, but I held that resentment for months.  Getting evilbike fixed was the final mend of this rift, it never felt right after the crash and sure enough, some ball bearings were missing.  Bicycle Sport Shop worked their magic and evilbike is as good (evil?) as new.

Second, I started tooling around the neighborhood on my cruiser.  No plan, no pace goals, no garmin, no clipless pedals, just enjoying getting a little activity and being outside.  5 miles here, 3 miles there, nothing earth shattering, just the act of riding a bike again without being scared or angry or frustrated at it was healing.

Then, and this is important, I ACTUALLY LEARNED HOW TO RIDE A BIKE WITH CLIPLESS PEDALS THE RIGHT WAY.  Yes, I’m shouting this.  I cannot believe I spent 4 years without somehow figuring this out, or having someone I was riding with correct what I was doing.

What you’re supposed to do – unclip one pedal while riding, and while still barely in motion, shift your weight over to stand on the unclipped leg.

June6-1

This guy is doin’ it right.  Credit HERE.

What I was trying to do – unclip one pedal while almost stopped, and then keeping my crotch over the seat, somehow force my bike to shift to the unclipped leg (while the motion of unclipping actually sort of makes you want to go the other way at a standstill).

What I ended up doing after falling a few times – unclipping both feet wayyyy before I stopped and keeping my crotch over the seat, so which ever way I landed would be fine.  Which looked a lot like this…

June6-2

Stolen from somewhere on Pintrest….oops.

Once I learned this and practiced it a lot (like, spent 20 minutes riding around my block, unclipping at EVERY stop sign), and it felt decently natural, we started riding in traffic.  Oddly enough, most of the fear I had was with the clipless pedals, and not the actual act of cycling.  When I felt in control of that motion, the act of cycling went from something that always held a little/lot of fear for me to something that was super enjoyable.  It was like a huge load being lifted off my shoulders.

While I’ll still maintain that going out to a country road with ~4 stops for a 40 mile ride (vs 4 stops for a 4 mile ride AT BEST around our neighborhood) is much better, I can’t do that every day.  Now, I can easily do recovery rides or rides with short intervals starting from my house, the gym, work, or actually anywhere.

May23-1

One thing that has ALWAYS bothered me is that 90% of the places I go on a daily basis are definitely within cycling distance.  My job is 3 miles away from where I live, my gym is 1 mile away from work, and that’s the majority of my driving each week.  The grocery, bars, restaurants, other stores that I frequent are also within cycling distance.  However, the problems have always been a) being scared of riding in traffic, b) worrying about cycling back home after eating/drinking, and c) not having a way to transport shit for errands.

I decided that we needed to figure out  b) and c) now that a) wasn’t really a thing anymore.  Two weeks ago, I decided we were cycling to lunch.  A little string backpack worked just fine to carry the few things I needed that didn’t fit in my short pockets, and cycling home on a full belly was just a little slower.   Then, we got an invite to a brewery that was just a few miles away, and decided to ride there as well.  The rule of thumb seems to be on par with driving a car safely – a few beers over a few hours?  Fine.  Especially when home was downhill!

May31-3

After that test run, we decided to take the next step and commute to work.  Doing things in the morning is not always my strong suit, but it just took getting on the bike and going… and realizing that it takes me only 10-ish more minutes to ride to work than drive.  NBD.  To bring everything I needed with me, I stuffed my little string backpack to the gills, but it was fine.  The absolutely amazing mood enhancer of getting in about 20-25 mins of cycling and fresh air before work made me so friggin’ happy at work.  Totally worth it.

It was so great, we decided to do it again that week, with a PM trip to the gym in the mix.  Zliten wore his giant backpack, and said it wasn’t bad, but wanted a better solution.  Also, I’m pretty sure that any time there’s an excuse to buy new gear, he’s going to take the opportunity.  That’s just how it goes.

Last week, we bike commuted once, and found out about the dark side of cycling to work… unexpected rain.  In the morning, it looked like it was going to be clear for us, and then, it POURED all afternoon.  We had to hole up at work for a few extra minutes while it cleared up, and then race home before the next storm hit, getting extremely wet from puddles.  The backup plan was to take the bus if we couldn’t find a decent 20 mins to get home, and I’m sure we’ll have to enact that plan someday, but so far, we’re 3 for 3 on successful commutes in 2 weeks.

June6-3

Saturday was my first test on evilbike riding out of my comfort zone – from the gym with more than just Zliten on busy streets where I’d never been before.  The choice to getting anywhere from there is crossing a freeway overpass, or riding on a very busy road.  Not optimal.  However, our friend Matt showed us a great little bike path that takes the rest of the ride from looking super sketchy to actually quite perfectly the way to get home from the gym.  We wound our way down to our normal neighborhood route, stopped for a pizza and beer lunch break, and started back to the gym (where our Xterra was).

Then, the rain just DUMPED on us.  The first time it was hilarious, the second time, there was so much water my contact flipped out.  We called it and rode the half mile back to our house, and we were going to drive Matt and his bike home in the Prius… and then we realized both of our sets of keys were at the gym in the Xterra.  D’oh!  Only two bikes fit in the back, so I let them go and changed into dry clothes and did the Oiselle Dozen and some chores in lieu of the extra 5 miles.

June6-4

Yesterday was our first test of really being able to live on two wheels… brunch and grocery shopping.  We cycled down to a taco place and fueled up first, and then hit the grocery store with a fairly normal sized list.  Luckily, everything totally fit in our new bike bag and basket.  We probably could have squeezed a little more in if we had to, but let me tell you, 6-8 mph was about the top of my comfort zone on the way back uphill fully loaded.  It was just fine for a nice afternoon 2.5 mile ride where pace didn’t matter at all.

Two things I have left on the “be a biker chick” list:

  1. Go on group rides.  I’m planning to do my first Parmer brick with the team this week (third attempt – first one we bailed, second, it got rained out).  After that gets comfortable (and I get a little fitter), I’d like to do some recovery rides and eventually some of the longer stuff with the cycle group.
  2. Get a tri bike.  I should be just ecstatic at doing this one, but I think I still feel lost about what to get and maybe subconsciously like I still don’t deserve one somehow.  Step #1 is going to be renting one for the race in 2 weeks.  I’m hoping that’s an amazing experience and will make me want to find my forever TT bike like, yesterday.

#projectspring is still definitely in effect, so I still have time to conquer these last two, and get better at the rest.

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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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