Adjusted Reality

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

Tag: running Page 29 of 50

Chronicles of Summer

By

On July 5, 2016

In Uncategorized

It’s a little harder to love the outdoors when the heat index is trying to kill you on the daily, but I’m still doing my best.

Bikes:

Jul5-2

Friday morning bikey bike commute time!

It’s hot as balls outside (right now, it’s feels like 111!!!), but on the bike, it feels… ok.  Until you stop.  Then the heat comes crashing down on you like a flaming mack truck… but the actual biking parts feel great!

I’m pretty sure in 2015, I cycled outside mayyybe 15 times?  I’d have to look it up, but it’s a decent approximation because during tri season I’d make sure to ride outside at least every other week on Saturdays and otherwise I wouldn’t.  Well, I’ve done at least that many outdoor rides in the last month.  Yay bikes!  Yay playing outside!

Jul5-1

Tire, you’re doing it wrong…

In fact – this happened to us on Thursday, and we’re just getting it repaired now.  We definitely keep a low mileage profile lately.  Shame the insurance doesn’t really give discounts for not driving a car much.  I think their lowest rate was for 10-12k per year.  We don’t usually get half that, in fact, our 3.5 year old Xterra just hit 11k miles.

Holiday, Celebrate:

My fourth of July weekend was pretty badass.  It started with an almost 2 mile swim and 4 mile run under the noontime ball of death.  After recovering from the feels like 102-105 temps on that run sucking down liquids under the AC, we meandered our way into the Texas countryside to a friend’s holiday bash.  That is, after a false start in which we forgot our food at home and had to turn around when we were halfway there.  Oopsie.

Jul5-4

Oh no.  Had to look at these views for longer.  Aw, shucks.

After the mishap was rectified and we got our tent set up, we spent the evening grilling, drinking punch, catching up with friends we hadn’t seen in a while, and tons of time in the pool.  Since we were the most sober ones (???), we got recruited to run “front of the house” (aka, the smaller fireworks like fountains and roman candles) while the other guys put on the big booms further away.  I’ve never done fireworks before, just watched.  It was fun!  We only had a few close calls, and everyone made it out with all eyes and appendages intact.  Success!

Jul5-5

Since I was helping put on the actual show and not snapping pics, here’s some kids (big and small) playing with sparklers before.

We spent the rest of the night playing beer pong, chupacabra dice, and more pool time.  And then holy crap it was way, way too late, so we crashed for a few hours in the tent before taking it all down again, and cooling off in the pool again before we headed home because the weather already wanted to kill us at 9:30am.  Yay Summer?

Sunday and Monday were pretty mellow.  We stayed around the house, slept, relaxed, caught up on class and chores, and other boring, responsible, but necessary things.  However, for the first time ever, we made it out to our neighborhood’s parade and joined in with our bikes.

Jul5-3

T-rex appreciated that we made it to play papparazi.

Training Week One:

Last week was a pretty decent embarkation into an actual schedule.  We aren’t popping out of bed at sunrise or anything, but it’s getting easier to set the alarm with something starting with 7.  Doing the noontime or evening runs are killer, but 1-2 of those shorties a week need to stay on the schedule until I conquer the feels-like-hot-as-balls heat index shit.

Jul5-7

This is what happens when you’ve stopped sweating and start getting goosebumps on a run, but aren’t willing to see 11 min/mile average pace.  😛

Week one of training summary:

  • Monday: lunch swim (~1200m in 22 mins, a few fast 50s in there), PM weights (45 mins)
  • Tuesday: morning run (3 miles in about 35 mins), bike commute (~10 miles in about 45 mins)
  • Wednesday: PM brick with the BSS team (~13 miles in 44 mins rode, 1.7 miles in 18 mins ran)
  • Thursday: Heavy arms/abs, light leg weights (45 mins)
  • Friday: Bike commute (~10 miles in about 45 mins)
  • Saturday: Swim challenge (3000m open water swim), hot noontime run (4 miles in 43:55)
  • Sunday: NADA.  Couch.

Summary: a little less than I had anticipated, I’m missing one 45 min trainer ride on the tri bike, but I commuted twice instead of the once I had planned.  I’m a-ok with 7 hours of outdoor heat acclimation summer goodness.

Week two’s plan:

  • Monday: weights at home (30 mins)
  • Tuesday: 2 mile morning run, 20 min pool swim, return to endurance cycle class
  • Wednesday: 2 mile run AM, weights at lunch, recovery ride with BSS
  • Thursday: 5-6 mile run AM
  • Friday: 20-30 min swim (AM, lunch, PM, wherever it fits)
  • Saturday: 20+ mile tri bike ride, 1-2 mile brick after
  • Sunday: Probably NADA.  Couch again.

I’ll probably bike commute one or two of these days as well (maybe Thursday and/or Friday), and with that, it’s looking like about 9 hours of goodness.  It’s a little jump from last week’s schedule, so if something falls off, it probably won’t be the end of the world.

Food stuff, scale stuff:

Jul5-6

Pork + udon noodle soup + onions and cilantro = love.  Stir fry accompanies this for extra veggie love.

Holiday weekends are always rough to be super healthy awesomesauce, but I didn’t do too badly.

I made a big batch of pasta veggie salad to bring to the party, as well as a lower calorie drink option (vodka, diet sprite, diet juice punch).  I ended up eating a SHIT TON of queso and chips too, but I looked at my calorie burn that day and my -1000 number to hit was about 2500 calories.  Thank you, return to training.  So… I think it worked out okay.

I had some stomach issues on Sunday, and couldn’t keep food down, so while it’s not the healthiest way to maintain your waistline, it did keep me from overeating. Or, errr, eating more than maybe 500 calories of the simplest digestible foods, I’m ok with that not happening again for a long time.

Monday, I ate pretty well, and batch cooked some food for the week and oatmeal fruit bars.  I switched out the fruit for just peaches and used butterscotch chips instead of chocolate, but… they rock paired with some greek yogurt for protein.  It’s nice to have something different for breakfast for a change!

I didn’t actually track my calories (back to it today), but my weight is about where I would expect it to be with that time of the month it is.  If all continues to go well, I predict July to be the month of 170-something, even on the mean white scale.

Speaking of mean while scales, we got some body fat calipers to play with, and while the scale measures me at something stupid like 41% body fat, the calipers have me more like ~25%, which puts me somewhere around the healthy range for females in their 30s.  Which sounds more reasonable.  While I am not a size 0 or anything, I am pretty fit and carry a lot of muscle, and don’t think I’m almost 50% body fat.

This week, I don’t have a whole lot of crazy going out planned, and a lot of good food ready made at home, so I expect it to be a pretty successful week on the “noms” front.

Jul5-8

On that note, I’ll leave y’all with our “trash panda” making off with Nacho Cat’s food, and bid you a lovely (short) week!

 

Podium Dreamin’ and Fixing My Running Form

By

On June 29, 2016

In Uncategorized

If you take a look at me, especially in wet spandex, in high resolution, at some particularly unflattering angles, I’m not exactly the person you would size up and think about being on the podium.  That’s for skinny, fit people with 8% bodyfat wearing extra small tri kits, right?

Pfluger05

Which, let’s face it, I am not.

Well, I’ve proved that theory wrong a few times with some podium action, but it’s the exception and definitely not the rule.  And because I keep improving just a little bit at the short, local stuff each year, it’s starting to be in my grasp to be fighting for the top few spots in my AG if things go really well.  It’s another avenue for motivation during a race besides just hitting HR/pace/power numbers, which is fun.

Pfluger03

I didn’t know it then, but 15 of the other 21 pink caps were behind me.

Size is barely a limiter at all in the swim.  Frankly, most triathletes that enter the local sprint tri not great swimmers.  Because I have pretty good form and practice swimming (both open water and speedwork in the pool) a few times a week, I usually come out pretty close to the front of the pack for my age group.

Cycling, I’ve clawed my way up the power to watt ratio with lots of specific work on how to hurt myself and like it over 1, 2, 5, 20+ minutes.  It’s changed from my worst sport to generally the one I place the highest, even with my old, entry level road bike.  This year, once I get the hang of my new Death Star, I have a feeling that I’ll be hanging on with the top ladies in my age group for said reasonably local-ish, smaller (and flatter) races.

Pfluger07

Thumbs up for doing all the passing and not much of the falling back.

My transitions could use a little work sometimes, but I rarely get hit by gravity anymore.  As the season goes on, I get more efficient, and I believe I’ve pared down to only things I really need.  I could do the shoes on the bike trick and go without socks, but I’m not quite there yet.

The run is where it all falls apart.  I’m generally hanging on in a good spot after the bike, if things went well.  I was fourth last race.  If I had a good run, I could have tried to hunt down third place and voila! Podium!  However, the ladies that are swimming and biking like me run 1-2 minutes faster per mile than I do.  What happened instead – I was in fourth, I got passed once putting me in fifth, and I’m actually really surprised that I finished in fifth because my run was only ninth best.  I just beat sixth, seventh, and eighth by enough on the swim, bike, and transitions, they ran out of room to catch me.

Pfluger15

Horns up because I earned my freezy pop!

There are two paths to get my 5 seconds of fame at an awards ceremony.

  1. Get so good at the swim and the bike that I’m coming off in first place, and hope I don’t get caught by more than 2 people in my age group on the run.
  2. Try to improve my run so I could possibly, potentially, maybe actually run someone down off the bike instead of getting passed passed passed passed passed all the time.

While the first would be really cool in and of itself, I think that I need to find the missing link for the second and it’s not the obvious things.  I’ve thrown volume at it, I’ve trained fast miles off the bike consistently, I’ve trained in the heat, there’s just something that’s not clicking on with my run in races.  So it’s time to do some things that I haven’t done before in pursuit of a better run leg.

First…nail down a nutrition plan AND FOLLOW IT.  I am NOTORIOUSLY horrible at this.  I went into the run at Pflugerville on ~40 calories in the hatch (from the half bottle of Scratch I sucked down on the bike).  I forgot how to eat on the bike and I am SO lucky I put an emergency gel in my handheld (who needs a gel on the run for 3 miles?  …that would be me).  The ONLY reason I did so well before that is I had remembered to eat some highly caffeinated chews about 1 hour before the race, and they were OBVIOUSLY wearing off the first half mile of the run.

Here are things I’m going to do:

  • Carby snacks.  I’m already working towards making sure I don’t overdo the protein and fat (while still hitting my daily recommendations) so I can dedciate every other calorie possible to CARBS (more carbs while taking care of the other stuff = better fueled workouts).
  • Fueling more workouts in better ways.  This is pretty much sports nutrition 101, but in practice, I think I’m a special snowflake who doesn’t need the calories to perform.  Yes, this takes away some of my french fry calories.  Suck it up, buttercup.  This will make me a better runner and probably more likely able to hunt someone down…. 😛
    • AM workout (less than an hour) – gatorade, coconut water, or other carby snack before I leave for work unless I’m eating breakfast right away.
    • AM workout (more than an hour) – one gel or equivalent every 45 mins, carby snack either before the workout, before I leave for work, or split between both (ideal).
    • Lunch workout – carby snack if I’m not immediately eating lunch (which is rare, but happens).
    • PM workout (less than an hour) – carby snack before (I should not be super hungry starting a PM workout), carby snack after or dinner within 30 minutes.
    • PM workout (more than an hour) – carby snack before, one gel or equivalent for every 45 minutes, and a carby snack or dinner within 30 minutes.
    • Any workout that goes beyond 2 hours – must have carbs before, every 45 mins, and immediately after.

Second…work on my running FORM.  Now that I’ve studied up on biomechanics and optimal running form, it’s pretty clear to me I’m doing it wayyyy wrong.  Apparently, I’ve been JOGGING and not RUNNING (running means both feet off the ground at the same time and according to race pics – I don’t do that).  We need to fix that, because my pride says that I am NOT a jogger.

Here’s some pictures from the race to illustrate my point.  Learn with me while I analyze my race photos.  This is what running is supposed to look like:

Posefallpull

My running “pose” position sucks.  I should look more like this guy above.  Instead this is what I look like:

Pfluger11

With my leg so low, I’m not getting any momentum as it swings through, so my stride length is super short and shuffly.  I am bent at the hips, I should be leaning with my whole body and my ankle should be dorsiflexed instead of straight up and down.

Pfluger14

With my pose lacking, it means the rest doesn’t go very well.  My leg doesn’t swing out very far because it has very little momentum, and I don’t have far to fall, so I’m not getting that good lean going on.  And that’s not good because that means my stride is short and lacking power.  Look – I’m jogging.  My feet are not both off the ground at the same time.  I’m a jogger.  Ugh.

Pfluger12

Because I’m not leaning (or falling) enough, I’m heel striking.  If I could get my body over my leg a little more I’d be hitting the ground on my midfoot, touching just a little heel (and also a little toe).  But I’m not.

This essentially puts the brakes on.  I’m giving up energy I worked really hard to create!  That sucks!  Why would I want to do that unless I was running down a steep hill?  If I can move my strike more forward, I can keep more momentum going, which means less energy needs to be created by ME per stride.

So, how do I do this?

Concentrate on my form every run.  I need to work on improving my pose, I need to learn how to fall correctly, and I need to strike in the correct spot on my feet.  Like riding a bike (or at least, riding a bike in traffic with clips), I need to concentrate on this all the time until it’s totally natural… and then probably some more.

Photographic proof of progress.  I need to have Zliten and I play paparazzi with each other more often to snag pictures and video of our running form to see how it’s developing.  Either set up a camera outside the house and do loops of our block or go to the track or something.

Drills.  I always say “yep, I should be doing drills” and what do I never do?  Drills.  I found a pretty comprehensive list of things to do here and I’m doing to make sure I do them at the very least once a week during an easy run.

Monitor my cadence.  Oddly enough, when I trend towards a 90+ cadence, I feel better, expend less energy, and I bet I’d be running instead of jogging.  This means smaller strides, but much quicker ones if I’m doing it right, which is not a bad thing.

Strength Training.  I’m already doing this, but I need to pay attention once I am running with good (better) form to see if it reveals any weaknesses.  Who knows, maybe this will solve the glute/hammie cramping thing I get during long runs?  That would be rad!

And, hey – if nothing else – it will be nice to do something on the run this summer instead of think about how hot it is!

 

Lake Pflugerville Triathlon

By

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.  

So I’m racing a triathlon in a few days…

By

On June 17, 2016

In Uncategorized

This weekend is my first triathlon of the season and also my first race in 2.5 months.  I am now officially 3 months into the #projectspring plan, which means minimal training.  It’s a very weird feeling this year, normally this race is the end of things, one more hoorah before I take some time off.  This year, it’s as things are ramping up a little.  That means there are a lot of different expectations (or lack thereof) on an untrained body vs a body that’s super trained and straddling the line of fitness and burnout.

LakePf

Last year, this was the face of the start of #offseason.

Day before/pre-race/nutrition plan/gear:

We’ll be grilling and celebrating Father’s Day with the ‘rents on Saturday, so it’s not the normal steak-n-taters, feet up, relaxing time.  However, it’s not as if we’re walking around Disneyland all day or anything, and we have a lot less accumulated fatigue to worry about.  What worries me the most is the sleep – midnight is generally bedtime for me these days, and if that holds true, that means very little sleep the night before.  So, I need to make sure to get really good sleep the rest of the week and also try my darnest to be in bed and relaxed early on Saturday night.

Belvita breakfast cookies and chocolate almond butter is my new race day breakfast tradition, so I’ll be sticking with that.  For caffeine, I’ll probably go with purple stuff – it makes me pee a lot so it’s bad for running races but perfect for tris because the world is your bathroom if you need it to be so.  I’ll take a few chews for pre-race, because breakfast to race time will be somewhere between 3-4 hours (grumble grumble 3rd to last wave grumble).

During the race, I’ll give myself the option of caff chews or a caff or non caff gel on the bike, and stash a gel in my pocket in case I feel awful right out of T2.  I’ll do gu brew or heed on the bike in my bottle.  I’m debating on the merits of carrying a frozen bottle on the run, and whether it should have water or sports drink.  Water is better for dumping on your head.  I might need the salt, sports drink has it, but can get sticky.  The temps will determine what I do here.

This is the first race I’ll be doing with my super pro looking set up.  Team race kit, aero helmet, new TT bike… I’m excited to at look fast, no matter where the actual numbers end up!

333496_10150973399544450_1197894477_o

Not my pro kit, but this tri makes me jump for joy!

Swim:

I definitely have endurance here, but I’ve lost a lot of my speed.  I’ve swam speedwork in the pool the last few months a total amount of ZERO times.  Also, we went to go do recon at the lake last week and HOLY HYDRILLA!  The lake zombies and plant monsters are out in full effect.  I’m hoping they’ll cut a path, but it’s likely it will end up being an out and back like they do for the August race.  Those usually end up long, crowded, and kind of scary (chance of head on collision with a stray swimmer is high).

I’m going to try to go out a few notches above a paddle, but I don’t want to be shelled getting out of the water.  I don’t expect a personal worst here, but I definitely don’t think I’ll be breaking any records.

T1:

First tri of the year usually means fighting a lot of transition gravity.  Hopefully being a familiar race venue will help.  I have new gear, but that shouldn’t mean much because it’s new versions of the same stuff I had before.  Sock shoe sock shoe sunglasses helmet bike go.

Jun17-1

I can’t believe I still wore a camelback 3 years ago… *blush*

Bike:

This leg could be very interesting.  My bike fitness is the LEAST in the toilet of all the sports, and I have a shiny new TT bike.  However, I’ve definitely not been training like I normally am at this point of the year, and I don’t really know the ins and outs of riding the Death Star yet.  Everything could click and I could have an awesome PR here, or I could feel weird and awkward and my legs don’t show up and I’m rolling through this race about 16 mph.

Depending on how things feel, I’ll push the bike REAL HARD and try to hang on for the run or I’ll take this easier and hope to make up some time later with fresher legs.  Honestly, if all goes well, my race strategy will lean towards the first choice because it involves finally getting to open up on my new toy.

T2:

Same as T1.  If I can, I’ll spin a little easier before dismounting (though the last part is a hill :P), and just remember the run starts the minute I leave my bike. Shoe off, shoe on, shoe off, shoe on, helmet off, race belt on, visor on, grab bottle and RUN!

Run:

I always like to leave a window open for good things to come in, but I would be absolutely SHOCKED if I could PR this leg of this race right now.  It would be 100% mental fortitude, not due to any amount of physical conditioning I have on the run right now.  I may get some advantage from riding my new bike, but I doubt that will make THAT much of a difference.

No matter what – I’ll run as hard as I can for three miles, because that’s pretty much the only way to pace a sprint triathlon.

Jun17-2

At the end of appropriately pacing a sprint triathlon.

Overall, I’m looking at this as a test to see where I’m at right now, physically, sure, but mostly mentally.  How do I feel in the morning?  Am I excited or just want it over with?  How do I feel reaching past the point of comfortably hard?  Is it like “fuck yeah, let’s dig at that pain cave floor” or still a bag of “nope nope nope nope nope”?

If I’ve learned anything in the last few months, it’s that you can’t force enthusiasm as much as you might try.  At the finish line, whether I’m chalking up a new personal worst or busting out a crazy great race, that’s just where I am at this moment in time.  Unicorns or not, it’s totally ok.  I’m excited to toe the line to find out.

Becoming the storm

By

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.

Page 29 of 50

← Previous

Next →

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...

Search

Pages

Archives

2026

2025

2024

2023

2022

2021

2020

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

2014

2013

2012

2011

2010

2009

2008

Login

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén