sticking to the unplan

things have been nuts for the past two week. lots of training, friends in town for four days, and perhaps the busiest time with grad school commitments ever. i am working on a manuscript for publication and i had some major deadlines to meet.

i trained 15+ hours last week and have been putting in some good workouts based on what i feel like. but my plan lacks a plan. i kind of need to stick to something if i'm going to manage this half ironman thing in 7 weeks. the biggest thing i need to do is put in some more bike volume and long rides. and longer bricks i think. and keep running. and make sure to swim at least 3 times a week or 10,000yds. that's the non-plan-plan.
this weeks workouts...and weekend "plan". wahoo, i have a plan!

monday: 1.5 hr trainer session (solid, but friends in town so had to get 'er done)
tuesday: a.m: Spin class and core strength class
p.m.: MAF test at track (7 miles running)
wed..day: a.m. Masters swim (3500yds)
p.m. BRICK workout w/ TCSD- 5 mile bike w/ one mile run...3 times. race pace.
thursday a.m. Masters swim (3550yds)
friday a.m. 1.5-2 hour ride
p.m. 1.5 mile open-water swim la jolla cove
saturday 70 mile ride w/ 30 minute brick run
sunday a.m. 14 mile run......s
p.m. short easy pool swim...maybe recover spin

wow. that adds up to a lot. i think on monday i may need a full day off. i always take a day off the legs (like just swim) but probably don't take enough full days off.


last night we saw the premiere of Dean Karnazes' documentary...documenting his 50 marathons in 50 states in 50 days. the coolest part was that he ran from mission to mission in california from Sonoma to San Diego the week prior to celebrate the premiere. he stuck around to answer questions after the film. pretty awesome. i just kept staring at his mondo calves and quads. he is pretty yoked for a runner. lots of muscle. i guess that's how he avoids injury..

speaking of marathons....wishing all my friends heading out to crush the San Diego Rock and Roll Marathon a good time...and
this week, for no apparent reason (in my life of haphazard coachless training which means i decide on my workouts when i get up in the morning.....which today, i am thinking a 2 hr ride and 1.5 mile ocean swim with the tri club).

MAF test 5/27
1.5 warm-up jog

mile 1/7:18/HR 149
mile 2/7:04/HR 154
mile 3/7:16/HR 155
mile 4/7:23/HR 155

1 mile w/d

SO...this was my first MAF test and mostly just a measurement of where i'm at. i did this around a track....it was really windy- not sure if that affects it. since i'm in the middle of race season, i won't be following any type of MAF training right now, but i was just curious where my aerobic HR is. i'm pretty sure i should have run this at a slightly lower HR. I used the formula 180-age (28) + 5 (because i have been exercising consistenly for 3 years). So that # would get me to 157. 157 ended up being my max during the test...

this weekend there is a fun ride planned - a "train ride"- taking the train up the coast to anaheim and riding back down. the planned route is a new one, a mix of canyons and coast, so it should be a fun time. i'll also be cruising around the marathon for my long run...

super secret race fuel and strategy

first, it's all about the pre-race fuel....and by the following picture, you can tell that i mean business. its business time...

friday night, 6:30 PM:
what's that she's holding? it looks LARGE! why is she giving me the "leave me alone, i'm eating stink eye"?...because she is holding the super amazing grilled mahi mahi burrito from el caribe, the best place on earth (by the way denner, even though you are a fish hater, this place is right by your work and has non-swimmy stuff too)....so its a mongous whole wheat tortilla filled with spinach, cabbage, salsa fresca, guacamole, grilled mahi mahi and that's it...perfection...
with salad on the side...and their perfect peanut carrot ginger dressing

and yes, i ate the whole thing...AND frozen yogurt less than an hour later...but it was this stuff...which i call the "healthy kind"..it has only 8 "all natural" ingredients, 8 calories per oz and the ingredients are like active yogurt cultures, maltodextrin (don't triathletes love this stuff?) and whey protein. YUM!..one pre-race meal....CHECK!

so here are the "race strategy" videos, all my secrets laid out- ...pre and post temecula 21k trail race...amusing.

pre-race (had to delete the videos they were junking up the html or something)



post-race


and i found out today that i won the points series for the Southwest region xterra trail run series...free entry into the national championships in bend, OR... probably won't make the trip but we'll see...
here's an article from the race (not exciting, please feel free to stop reading here, this is more for my own life documenting as this blog is like my scrapbook), it really only mentions me quickly. BUT, if you do read it, you will notice that had i been "more than one minute" faster, i would have won a free round trip ticket to hawaii
DILLON AND MAGUIRE FIND VICTORY AT VAIL LAKE
(Temecula, CA) – More than 250 runners from eight states, Canada and Mexico took part in the XTERRA 5km, 10km, and 21km trail runs at Vail Lake Resort in Temecula, CA this morning. With temperatures reaching into the high 90’s, no shade at all on the course, and several hundred feet of climbing through the rolling hills of Temecula’s wine country, this morning’s runs were no walk in the park.

The men’s 21k winner was 23-year-old Benjamin Dillon, an active U.S. Navy man from San Diego, CA (via Louisiana). It was the first big victory for Dillon, who took up running just after high school. Dillon’s time of 1:51:05 was a full two minutes ahead of runner-up Jamison Smith of Alta Loma, CA.

"I was really surprised to do so well,” said Dillon. “I knew with the heat I had to go out slow for the first part of the run and conserve energy, and that really paid off towards the end of the race as the leaders started to fall back."

In the women’s race 49-year-old Judy Maguire from Idyllwild, CA put in a late race surge to pass dozens of racers, including a handful of the lead men. Maguire, a stand-out road runner in Florida during the 1990’s, finished third overall and crossed the line in 1:53:08, more than a minute ahead of Beth Gerdes from San Diego.

"I really just started to run trails recently and we’ve got lots of hills in Idyllwild to train on so I was comfortable with the climbing on this course."

With the victory, Maguire won roundtrip airfare to Hawaii on Hawaiian Airlines as part of the company’s push to get more women out and active. "That's really neat, I think I might just have to use that ticket to do the XTERRA Trail Run World Championship race in December."

21k xterra temecula trail race

so, i had a race of my own this weekend as well, but it was really on my calendar as a big training day, not an A race like james' (which was a killer performance but i'll let him tell you about it)..

on saturday, i headed out to temecula for the Vail Race 21k "xduro", the final race of the Xterra So Cal trail run series . i had already run the Crystal Cove 15k and Mission Gorge 15k, so adding this one in gave me a shot at winning the points series for my AG, and it looked like it would be brutal fun. the race fit in to the weekend pretty well since james needed to head to temecula to pick up his race packet and do his mini pre-race workout...

we got to the race around 7:15 for the 8:30 start. the forecast was 95 degrees and blazing sun. i got in a 15minute warm-up with 4 pick ups to race pace and headed to the start line. for some stretching and the course talk
i found out the run would be one loop of the 12.5mile xterra bike course for the triathlon held the next day, and a "short" "add on" from the run course. james had prepared me to recallize that this means lots of climbing, more climbing, hills that are "rollers" on a bike, but not so much rollers when you are running up. we were also told that there would be 9 aid stations. perfect! no carrying water for me. just a gel and i'm good to go.

i head to the start line with about 125 others and james points out Paula Newby-Fraser (ex-pro, the most winningest ironman female champion ever) and Katya Meyers, pro triathlete- smart, pretty, and fast!..i was so excited to even be in the same race as them. look how happy i look BEFORE 3150+ feet of climbing in 14 miles.

the cannon went off (literally, and it was scary loud) and off we went. after the first few hundred yards, katya ran off the front pretty fast and i followed 10 steps behind her with two other guys. i had a couple "why am i at the front, just asking to blow up moments? what am i doing here?" but it felt comfortable and i remembered something james had showed me in the morning (c/o GZ)...it said, "how to win a race. (and you click on it and it says:) "Go out hard. When it hurts, go harder". well, i thought to myself, it doesn't hurt yet, let's keep going.

katya stayed in front of me for a couple of miles and then i went ahead for a mile knowing she was right behind me. i told james afterwards that i only went ahead here because i "felt bad" for sitting right behind her for so long. he said, "it's a RACE". anyhow, all was well and good until we hit the long, big climb known as the dam climb. i got passed on the climb by 6 or 7 people including paula newby-fraser and katya and a handfull of dudes. not sure why i was being dropped on the climb (about mile 4 & 5), i decided that the only way to run this race was to run my own race. ease up when i felt like crap, go hard when i didn't. so i kept running. i took a quick wrong turn, but looked back and saw where i was supposed to go about 10 yrds back uphill. no big deal, maybe a minute lost at most.

after the dam climb, miles 6 through 8 were a lot of rollers up on the ridge. i hit an aid station right before mile six at about 45 minutes and decided that the next station would be where i took my gel w. water. well, that next aid station took 4 miles to come! i pretty much almost lost it here, but kept it together somehow. the heat and dehydration were pretty ridiculous. i've never done anything like this. during this time, even though it was a major low point, i think it was much lower for others, i ended up passing and gapping everyone who had passed me on the first big climb and led the women for a mile or two until one woman passed me around 8 miles. i hadn't seen her before and at first thought she was one of the 10k runners and didn't put much thought into it until i saw her bib was for our race about 2 miles later (we regrouped at the long-awaited aid station as we both stopped to gulp, pour, gulp multiple glasses of water after the long drought). she took off a couple seconds before me around mile 10 and then put some time into me for the rest of the race. i had it together and she was in my sights until mile 12, but i kind of had a little bit of a mental breakdown after that.

you see, i had heard someone say before the race , "the course is actually 12.5 miles if its the same course as the xterra bike loop" so i thought it would be shorter than 13.1miles, but prepared to run the whole 13.1 if distance if that's what it was. around 12.5, the course took a sharp right and went gnarly single track uphill AWAY from the finish (oooh....its the bike loop PLUS some of the run course). i almost lost it. the guy in front of me did.

i lost sight of the woman ahead, but didn't see anyone close behind. i knew i just needed to somehow make it, there was only that one women and a few men ahead of me. at 13.1 i realized that i was still not near the finish...WTF? i was getting mad (heat hallucinations here), the race was supposed to be over and i wanted to lay down on cold grass or put my head in ice or something, anything! i was a little out-of-it in general, but i kept running (or shuffling :) ) and made it to the finish in what garmin said was 13.85....i couldn't believe i had made it! i promised james some fist-in-the-air action at the finish and i delivered...




the results:
2nd woman overall, 5th overall overall, 1st age group.
my time was 1:55:29 (the overall male winner was 1:51 so it wasn't your average half-marathon+-and i was stoked to be only 4 minutes down from him..) i really couldn't believe that i had placed in the top 3 women, and was totally blown away by the fact that i had come in ahead of some great competition that i never dreamed of racing against! it was fun crossing the finish because i think james was pretty surprised too.

right after the race was my favorite because i got to meet and talk to "my new best friend, katya" :)
she was super down-to-earth and cool overall. i might have freaked her out when i told her that i read bree's blog, so i knew she had just gone to australia, and also that i read once that she liked golden spoon frozen yogurt (my obsession)...i hope i didn't creep her out. i swear i am normal. well normal-ish. anyhow, she was really great and we may run together sometime soon.
talkin' course with Paula Newby-Fraser and Katya...

"...you see..what had a happened was.."
we stuck around for the awards (big props to james for sticking out the 100 degree heat for hours the day before his big race and taking pictures and being patient and awesome and looking like a river rat truck driver...




the 25-29 podium...me, katya, and whoever was smart enough to get the hell out of that blazing sun and not be there. i got a lei! (the only one of the weekend if you remember the all important "bullet point #4"....just kidding..i just can't resist an easy bad joke.)

that's all for now, i have another post coming with my race "strategies" that worked, lessons learned and stuff. hope everyone had a fantastic weekend.

congratulations to everyone else who had great races this weekend including matt who did the sufferfest with me, the other matt who kicked ass in encinitas, trevor who was the green flash, jim who threw down a top 10 pro finish, jaakko who says real men don't draft, and felipe the brazilian god of tri

while i was racing, i truly thought to myself, "i could quit....but then i'd have to right a yucky race report of all the things i did wrong without making excuses...." i think the blog really holds me accountable...because i can't just write it off, i have to write it down!

i guess all you bloggers keep me honest...and i KNOW all you bloggers keep me inspired on a daily basis. i can't wait to read everyone's weekend reports tonight..just me, my fro yo, and my computer while james is at the pads game..YES! (holy nerd)

GIT it, DOG!

when james and i are out and about, and we see someone (especially someone that looks like they are newly minted to the fitness world) on the street digging in to make it up a hill on the bike or pushing a 40lb baby jogger or sweating their face off in general, we say, "GIT IT, DOG!" a special cheer for whoever it is that is out there laying it down and doing the work. love to see people going for it.


speaking of going for it, this is a big weekend. you know why? because this guy:

has his A race. but we're not supposed to talk about the race. the race is like fight club. but this is my blog.

this race is the reason for the past 6 months of...
*weird data crunching, analysis, comparison...and then re-crunching, analysis, more comparison (let me tell you, it is super fun to watch him compare a graph of yesterday's workout to the wednesday before last year's world championships and normal power this and that and negative training stress load or TSS or something that sounds like a disease that teenaged girls are scared of and WOW this is so interesting, and can you tell me that part about march 1st again? oh yeah, that's hot)

*4:50 am wake-up calls (you see "james time" is 10 minutes ahead of actual time so even when he sets the alarm for 5:00, it is really 4:50 and that is ungodly)

*ugly-face-making trainer workouts when i should know better than to come in the garage unless i want to be reminded that at that moment, he's not interested in me trying to be cute and get attention and talk about what i want to eat for breakfast (cottage cheese with peanut butter and jelly mixed-in!) or how my toe hurts or i need a manicure or something else important like that.

*speaking of bike riding(earmuffs, Mr. Walsh)...has anyone seen those "i ride my bike more than my girlfriend" t-shirts?...

in life, james is a master planner and everything goes smoothly (and was probably much smoother before i jumped in and junked up the machine). james is the hardest working person i know but makes it look easy. he is methodical, calculated (in a non-serial-killer-kind-of-way) and scheduled to the second and i pretty much try to stay out of the way and not mess things up (which is impossible because i am a tazmanian devil and leave a trail wherever i go). i try not to question. james does not like to be questioned. by me at least.

but, all this stuff is a part of the reason why i love him so much and fell for him as soon as i met him. i love that he can't really see all the weird stuff he does and insists that he is not obsessive or compulsive and he will read this (no doubt as he is sitting at the kitchen table at 5:10 am "james time" with coffee, or maybe 6am because things get "loose" in race week) and call me a "hater". but really, his obsessiveness is what makes it all work. AND, all the things he does are things that show me how dedicated, focused and amazing he is. and when you really love someone, you love them for all the little things that make them "unique", not in spite of them.

i'm still not quite sure how he trains 20 or so hours a week, works a full time job (and is a freaking geek genius), shops, cooks, cleans, and basically keeps it all together. and, all this is combined with the job of keeping me happy, well fed and loved in general- and i'm not easy! its no wonder that when his head hits the pillow, i can count in one breath the number of seconds it takes him to begin snoring. (please see bullet point 4 above)


anyhow, i can't WAIT for sunday to watch him tear it up- i really think that i am anticipating this as much as he is and he totally deserves a great race. and i will be proud (well, as long as he wins :) ). i'm so excited i get to be there and there's nothing i'd rather do than support him in every way i can as he lives all this out. i'll be there now, over the next six months as he lives out the same cycle again (being a triathlete is sometimes like groundhog day), and hopefully much longer than that.

oh yeah, and in that picture, james is using a technique he learned in the petite guys club (PGC) where you lift the bicep with the finger to give the appearance of yoked-ness.

Go James...Git it, DOG!

its business time

saturday was the May TCSD club race. i won't be in town for the June and July club races (sad!), so i thought i'd do this one for fun even though it was just a week after my last race.
i got to the race site on coronado island at 6:15 for a 7am start, so not much time for warming up after setting up transition, checking in, etc...

the race was 800-1000 meter swim, 11.5 mile bike, and 3 mile run.

the gun went off when i was chatting with 3 friends in the water. i hadn't warmed up at all, but wasn't worried. this one was just for fun, right? well, during the swim, since it was a mass start with about 150 people, i thought it would be a good time to practice drafting off feet since i have been draft-less in my prior races. i thought to myself, "swim, swim, swim, surge...to the next feet. swim, swim, swim....surge.." well, during the swim out (about 300) to the first buoy, i did a lot of, "swim, swim over, swim under, knocked in face, sitting on slow feet, surge...more of the same" it was by far the most crowded/violent race start i have been in, so good practice. and i definitely did a "note to self" not to pick feet to draft off of too early- pretty sure i hung on to some slower folks for a while, all proud of myself for being on feet, all disregarding that they weren't so much moving fast.
anyhow, around the first buoy, things thinned out a bit and i still had some good feet...yay! i kept my swim consistent and felt aerobic the whole time (hmmmm...should i be going harder in a sprint?), but felt great. exited the water and then..

T1 - total disaster! i couldn't for the life of me get my wetsuit top over my head. my arms simply wouldn't lift it! i ran all the way to my transition with the top fully on and it seemed like it took forever to get off. all the while, matt and brian long were there and i kept talking about how slow/embarrassing my transition was. i'm sure they got a good laugh...

bike- one the wetsuit debaucle was over, the rest was fine and I hopped on the bike for the 11.5 mile pancake-flat out and back down the "silver strand". i felt pretty good on the bike and kept things moving. again, i was very aerobic. my race the week prior felt much more in the red zone overall. but, i was definitely moving, and despite the aerobic comfort, my muscular situation was quite different. full-on lactic acid party in the legs, so it wasn't like i could go faster just becuase my heartrate was low. my legs would have fallen off. i got passed by 1 girl on the bike right out of T1 and one more girl at the end (bethany!)- she and i were both out for fun today so we chit-chatted for the last mile of the ride, smiling, having fun.

T2- when we got to T2, i knew it was time to do a little work. i knew i could catch at least one of the women ahead of me, and i ended up catching/passing 4 as well as a bunch of dudes. i came across the line as 4th place overall, and i was very happy. there was some REALLY tough competition out there today (the winner is a fast kona qualifier, and the two behind her are very fast) and a couple women i had passed were one's who had come in ahead of me at last month's club race- so i think i'm improving!

after the post-race fun, i finished up the morning with 30 more miles on the bike with some good company- tina, jess, and elena. so a strong, fun day overall! 40 miles total/bike and a triathlon on the day- that's work for me!

sunday i woke up and hit the coast for a 3 hour ride. denner stepped out his doorstep, planning on riding about 20 with me before his brick run, but somehow i convinced him to stay with me the whole time. it was super fun (except for the apocalyptic experience where we found ourselves being pelted by huge beetle roaches for about 100 yds-nuts!), great weather and we even got in some good climbing up torrey pines and la jolla shores. i was especially stoked because he raced vineman 70.3 last year as his first half ironman and had a TON of good info for me.

other than that, this week will start with some good work, and the mellow out on the training front as i am running what james tells me will be "the hardest thing you've ever done" ...the xterra 21k trail race...i can't wait! and i'll be doing a lot of this...i need to lock it down and study, study, write, write, write.



you see...it's finals week...and i need to get down to business...speaking of business, its business time.


lately, i've been singing this throughout the day. every time has turned into "business time"...frozen yogurt time is business time, workout time is business time (especially if its on the trainer...its BUSINESS time), when james does his morning routine which ends in a flush, that's business time.. this video (and flight of the conchords in general) is awesome.
this morning, james and i were sitting with coffee at our computers at 6am ..and i started g-chatting him (sitting the same room) saying..".i love it when you sit there in your cut off man tee, with the baggy flannel pants aunt rita bought you for christmas....so sexy...and then we clean the refrigerator together, but thats not a part of business time...that's when i know, its business time..." then he gave me the stink-eye. and i went upstairs and got ready for work. fun times.

oh yeah, and its for reals business time...james A race is sunday in temecula, the xterra west championships. he's going to kill it. i can't wait!

sprint sprint triathlon- officially a triathlete!

sunday we woke up mega early (4:45) to head down to Spring Sprint, my first "real" triathlon. we got to the race site as transition opened and racked our bikes with all the breakaway training homies. it was a little chilly, but i knew once i did my warm-up dance things would be fun...here's me and bethany-she's my best bud and my best competition!
I did (almost) all the right pre-race stuff: my tires were pumped, i laid out my transition area well, got in a full 20 minute run warm-up with 4 pick-ups to LT and even remembered to put my hair in a low ponytail so it could fit in the helmet and i wouldn't have to "re-do" it in transition like at the club race....see!the only things i didn't do were 1) warm-up on the swim...i wasn't sure where we were and were not allowed in the water, there were tons of jellyfish, and i wanted to stay where i could cheer on james as his wave came out of the water into T1...the other thing i for got to do was 2) zip up the back of my trisuit...moron. i did the whole thing with it unzipped. not that it mattered, just looks kind of funny i guess, but then again, i was wearing an aero helmet, so "funny looking" is relative.

okay, race time!

the swim:
my wave started at 7:25 and there were 44 girls in my age group. it was an in-water start, which i've never done and we all kept floating into eachother. the gun went off and my goal was just to stay on lead feet as long as I could. well, i lost all feet pretty quickly and was swimming alone. not sure how that is possible in a 400 meter swim, but it is. i couldn't see anything around me becuase i was wearing new goggles that fogged up like a mo fo. in my defense, they are the same brand (aquasphere kaiman small) i wear all the time, the only difference was that these had mirrored lenses...during the last 100 meters, i considered pulling them off for a minute to make sure I was going the right way, but i eventually just went with it. my swim ended up being not that bad considering i had only swum 3 times in the six weeks prior. so i am very stoked becuase that means there is plenty of room for improvement

total swim time (plus run up the ramp to T1): 7:47, 5/44 AG

T1:
I was a little nervous because we hadn't had time to practice these the day prior (coach james is a slacker), but he talked me through it and my goal was just to not sit down and not do stupid girly stuff (fix my hair, dry my face off, etc). I think i actually had a really good T1, but i can't see the splits because the timing company includes them in the bike time. I clopped out of T1 (no shoes clipped in for me...need way more practice for that)

THE BIKE (my nemesis!)
i set out to ride hard and that i did. the bike was only 9 miles- 2 loops around "fiesta island" so i knew that i could just go as hard as possible and hope i could run off the bike. i exited T1 a little before bethany and she promptly caught and passed me on the bike. i kept her in my sights for about 2/3 of the ride, but lost sight of her. other than that, i didn't get passed by any women in my AG and i think i passed 2 girls who must have been strong swimmers...i had a few of those "why am i doing this?" moments on the bike because it is so hard for me and i haven't really found my love for it yet, but overall, it wasn't that bad..and i felt like i was going pretty fast!

total bike time: 29:28 (includes T1) 4/44 AG

T2:
can i tell you how excited I was to get to T2? my quads were squealing and i was hoping my legs would be there, but i was ready. i pulled my shoes on superfast and was out of there. i think my transitions were on it.

the run:
i BOLTED out of transition with superfast turnover. i think i was a little overzealous, i ran by dave p from breakaway training but he promptly caught back up to me after a couple hundred yards, which was lucky for me because he ended up totally pacing me and kept me going in the run (if you check out his blog you can see a run pic of him with me trailing him-nothing like a 7 foot tall neon orange "carrot"! I hope his wave starts 5 minutes behind me every race!). we started passing people. lots of people. and i was huffing and puffing that first mile. i wondered if the whole run would hurt that bad (it didn't). i sounded like a little kid with asthma who forgot the inhaler. at mile 1, dave looked at his watch 6:24. sweet! i thought we were going WAY slower. the next couple miles were easier and i probably could have pushed harder. i think i passed 3 girls in my AG, but not sure...all i know is when i ran across the finish i was stoked and i knew i could have kept going (maybe didn't run hard enough?)

run time + T2= 19:21 (3 miles + T time- nice! i was especially please b/c there was a couple hundred yards of soft sand and some other turn-y stuff in there) 3rd AG (one girl ran a 17something, WTF?- awesome!)

overall:
2nd/44 AG, 3rd overall (age grouper)/200+
total time: 56:36

so i ended up placing 2nd in my AG! I was so excited because i really had no expectations other than not making the mistakes i made in my "practice" race, and i felt that i swam and biked stronger than i thought i could. i think i am still smiling. it was just so fun and i really had no idea i could compete for spot up there...i looked over the times and my time was 3rd amateur female overall and 5th if you include the (two) "elites" (and one of them was only 15 seconds faster than me.) so i think i really surprised myself and got myself excited to work on my weaknesses (bike bike bike swim swim swim) and get ready for San Diego International on June 29th...

more photo fun:
the final stretch on the run...felt awesome- next time i need to push it a bit more. my race suit from de soto was fantastic and my new zoot racers (a pre-race surprise from the best boyfriend ever) were so fast, comfy, and light

posing after the finish with james

after catching my breath, we headed back to the car to change and then hung out with the crew until the awards ceremony...a good crowd stuck around...fun times..i am so lucky to be surrounded by such great people, and live in san diego, and do this, and have my boyfriend be right there with me, and am just so thankful that i can do this because i know just how lucky i am to be healthy and happy.


bethany and I - both our first triathlon medals - way to represent in the 25-29 AG- bike month paid off! we both had fun during the race pushing eachother...she blew by me on the bike...but i caught up in the run.sportin' the silvers....oh wait, james doesn't have his on (ahem...can somebody please tell that girl that everyone else has taken off their medals..)...but i like this picture better than the other one that was originally here.
and the real champ...Emilio DeSoto's father came out and did the duathlon...winning the 75+ age group..Awesome!
thanks to chuck for taking pictures! always awesome...

triathlon time

the time has come...
enough of this "triathlon-ish" crap. after this weekend, i will (hopefully) be a triathlete. for reals. like in a real [paid-for] race (not that the TCSD races aren't "real", but they are more good fun training against your friends :) )...
and i'm very excited. it's a short race. spring sprint is a 1/4 mile swim, 9 mile bike, 3 mile run. i kind of feel like a dork for being excited about this mini-race, but i just am! james is racing too, with the whole breakaway training crew...so that will be fun (and also means i will be there on time....maybe we should just camp there...)

and of course, i have a fun new trisuit to sport....the guys (emilio and chuck) over at DeSoto have been so awesome to me and hooked me up with their brand new 2008 ITU suit! So, I'm not an ITU racer, but this thing screams fast. here it is....
okay, that picture sucks but i didn't realize it when i took it with my phone camera (on the fabulous backdrop of my green t-shirt sheets) and am too lazy to take/upload another becuase that would take a whole 90 seconds.

i don't have any specific goals for this race other than to try not to make the same mistakes i made at the TCSD club race last month (no warm up, no pumped tires, embarrassingly slow transitions). my swim still isn't near where it should be (5 weeks no swimming) - just got back in the pool last thursday, but the swim is short, so i can take it. i haven't done any open water swimming (the shark attack deterred me a bit for the time being), but james has promised to practice swim starts (and transition!) with me on saturday to help me get ready. (i am writing this so he can't get out of it....

as for cycling- i've been working on it and I did 2 long rides last weekend and have been pretty consistent with bike workouts during the week as well. i'm still not where i hope to be in six months, but making slow and steady improvements ( i like to think).

jim vance, pro triathlete and TrainingBible coach gave me some good tips based on some pictures from the club race....how cool!

thanks, jim! i've been focusing on keeping my heels parallel to the ground all week....and the tires will be PUMPED...just like me. (sorry...so cheesy)