Happy Thanksgiving

Hi peoples of the internet!
I know I haven't blogged in a bit, been soooooooo busy with work and feeling run down. I just wanted to say that I have kept up on my blog reading, but not my writing. Congrats to all the IMAZ participants out there. I owe a race report for the Miami Man race, which was tiring, but great!
Had a stupid moment of weakness and signed up for the Disney marathon on Jan 11 and I have never gone farther than 13.1 miles, and I thought that was pretty darn far. My hubby has been training for it for a few months now and the mother-in-law will be here visiting so in my moment of profound stupidity and seeing capacity at 99%, I signed up. Now I don't actually expect to complete 26.2 miles, but it would be cool to finish. The problem with Disney is the 7 hour time limit. I am a walk/jog kind of gal, but I don't know how long I can keep a 16 min mile pace going.
The half last year was really cool, so I figure what the heck, why not! I do need to commit to a long run/walk at least once a week and I have not :( I had the Miami Man a couple weeks ago and that was 4 hours of good cardio. I've got a metric century a week from Sunday or a half marathon with hubby, need to decide soon I guess.
Any sorry for the rambling. I need to get some workouts in before Turkey day so I don't feel guilty for all the yummy stuff I will be stuffing myself with, hehe. Have a happy one! Hopefully doing the Run for the Pies on Turkey Day morning with the hubby. Hoping he will win us a pie, haha.

Breast cancer awareness ride

I know I have been busy and I haven't posted in a little while. Between work and getting my taxes together, it has been a crazy October. I just realized a couple days ago that my Miami Man international tri is less than a month away, aghhhhhh. So today I was back at the gym "running". I did went for 44 minutes and did around 3 miles. 1st mile was13:40 and I did 2 miles in 28:10. Not bad for taking a little break. My shoulders were bugging me a little bit, but feeling better all in all. I am hoping to drag my booty out of bed at 5:15 am for the early morning spin class, I really need it. Not to worried about the swim cause it's only 1,000m.
I did get out Saturday on my bike and did the Trek Breast Cancer Awareness Ride. We did just over 13 miles and it was super hot. They kept the pace slow and we had a great time. Trek gave out some AWESOME schwag. We got cool girly T-shirts, cycling socks and a water bottle. they also had lots of samples of Powergel soda flavored gummie things, they were okay, a little on the large size though. Trek also sent all the stores some great prizes to raffle off. Lucky for me & my buddies, this was the 1st year this store participated, and they only signed up 11 days prior to the ride, so needless to say, there was not a big crowd. My best friend one a Bontragger women's saddle and I won a Trek clock that I put on my daughters bike and she loves it! It was a great event and I am looking forward to next year. Hoping they do a 25 mile option because they should have alot more people coming. Thanks again to Teacherwoman for blogging about the ride!
Well that's all for now. Everyone in our house is feeling good, no one is sick, so life is good! Work looks like it's picking up a bit, so yahoo!

Gotta get my butt in gear!

Haven't posted in a bit. Been busy with work and my little one has still been sick :( After going to the dr like 3x in the last 2 weeks, I think she is finally getting over it. She has been hacking really bad for a month now, and it looks like it was walking pneumonia, more than likely. So the antibiotics were not agreeing with her and we had a rough night the other night, but she is doing better now.
My best friend was in Target the other day and came across 2 WiiFits! Oh yeah baby, we got one. I have only been looking since April and been kicking myself every day for not pre-ordering one! I gotta say that I love this thing! All 3 of us have been on it & it rocks. The little one has a hard time with some of the stuff, but it will certainly teach her some feet-eye coordination! What cracks me up the most is that it told me I was a good runner, LOL! My hubs said that too bad I can't do my tri and run on the Wii. Yeah in a perfect world. Sad part is I actually enjoy running to the Wii. You don't run on the board, you just run in place holding the controller and your little Mii runs down a trail. I unlocked a new trail tonight, but I haven't run it yet, but I will tomorrow.
I really need to get back to training. I have been putting myself last lately because I have too much stuff going on, ugh!
Hopefully I can at least squeeze in a few workouts this week, even if I need to get up at the crack of dawn and hit the early spin class, I need to do it. Someone please kick me in the butt and get me moving! My eating has not been great lately either, I have got to make better choices and I am gonna start sliding backwards!

Back away from the carrot cake!

I can't believe that Tuesday is over already! Aghh.
Did 43 minutes on the elliptical tonight, burned 600 calories to make up for having carrot cake for breakfast. My day just started off on a stressful note and stupid me heads straight for the food! Go figure :(
So I was a little sore yesterday from Sunday's tri. Today I am feeling more back to normal, but I am still having some knee pain, like right under the knee cap. What is up with that? It is also feeling a little sore and swollen. I am hoping in another day or two I can start running on it again :)
Its been an incredibly stressful week and its only Tuesday. The good news is that I am getting stuff checked off my list, but the bad news I still have a ton more things that are about to come crashing down onto me. Oh well I will pull myself thru it somehow, as I seem to thrive on stress.
Good news today too, it looks like I saved over $2,200 on my homeowner's insurance! Yeah baby, that rocks. And no I don't live in a mansion, I live in Florida where it is legal for the insurance companies to rape you for years and drop you the second you make a claim. And when we replace our roof this winter, we will be able to switch to an even better company and save more money!! Double yeah!! At least I got a bit of good news today :)
Oh yeah by bubs is still coughing her little head off. I think she is going back to dr tomorrow, its been like 3-1/2 weeks of coughing! They've gotta be able to do something to help. I know they don't like to medicate little ones, but none of us are sleeping well with her hacking all night!

Prelim AFAC Tri Race Report

Well I survived the "Athletes for a Cure" Olympic distance triathlon. My time wasn't great (4:17), but ironically it was identical to my Chicago time a month ago. Well at least I am consistent :)
So my breakdown looks like this:
Swim: 42:55
T1: 5:58
Bike: 1:36:49
T2: 2:31
Run: 1:49:28
Finished 9th out of 9 in 1-39 Athena. I am the definition of "back of the pack!"
I am happy that I finished, it was a fun race for the most part. The run course sucked a bit because it was 2 loops and 1 mile of the loop was thru some bumpy grass, it was not a path ever, it was mainly a canal embankment. Many people were afraid to run here for fear of twisting an ankle. This was my least favorite part.
Will have more to follow later, as I am sooooooooo tired. We just finished driving back from Orlando and of course I had to take my bubs to the theme parks after the race so I am beat.
Also I had the worst nights sleep last night, but more on that later.
All in all it was a great experience and I had a good time!

The car is packed!

Well I decided last minute to do the "Athletes for a Cure Triathlon" formerly known as the Disney Triathlon. So we are packed up and headed to Disney. I hit the expo & bike drop today and we race at 6:45am tomorrow morning. Bubs is excited to see Mickey and ride the ride, as am I :)
So off we go to wonderful hot orlando, yeah :)
Race report to follow...

Today's workout

Today was a semi-productive kind of day. I got several things knocked off of my to-do list. Got home from work and just wanted to sit on my butt and get some stuff on computer done, but hubby asked me to go to gym and I couldn't say no to that, as I have been begging him to start going with me.
He is training for his 1st marathon - PF Changs Rock N Roll Arizona in January. With any luck the mother-in-law will be over visiting at this time and I will be able to sign up for the 1/2 (fingers crossed). I am proud of him as he is really sticking to his training schedule! Go Hubs!
So I only had 50 minutes to do a workout cause the kid care shuts at 9, so todays workout looked like this:
15 min on dreadmill. Did 1/2 mi non-stop at a 13:20 pace until I had to take off for the potty.
After that I hit the weights:
leg press: 110# 3 sets of 30
leg extension: 50# 2 sets of 15
lying leg curl: 40# 2 sets of 10
bicep curl: 50# 3 sets of 12
tricep extension: 40# 3 sets of 12
assisted pull-ups: 103# 3 sets of 5
assisted dips: 103# 3 sets of 10
lat pull-down: 60# 2 sets of 12
seated row: 50# 3 sets of 12
I could have pushed myself harder, but I am trying to "rest" my shoulders. I am still getting weird spasms between my shoulder blades. Hoping it will just go away...
Hubs did like 3.5 miles in 42 min.

My fastest mile & my fav TV shows are back!

So today I am SUPER DUPER excited that Biggest Loser Families & House start tonight !!!!

I lost my motivation to get up at 5:15 this morning to catch the early spin class, so I was hoping to catch the 5:45pm spin class tonight and I got there about 5 min late and the class was full :( So I dumped by bubs in the day care and decided to ride the recumbent bike for 30 minutes. After sweating my butt off for 30 minutes there I hopped on the dreadmill to do some intervals and see how quickly I could interval through a mile: 13:12, my best indoor mile time yet :) yeah me. Also I ran several longer intervals at 5 mph and still had the feeling of running slow, it seemed easy. Oh god I hope this is a sign of things to come, that I am right on the edge of not totally sucking at running any more. I feel a breakthru coming in the next month or two, you just watch!

So yesterday I dragged my dh to the gym, he ran for 45 min or so while I fussed with getting bubs into daycare and than I went to swim. It looked like this:
2x 25 warmup
2x 25 kick on side
2x25 gloves
1x 100 pull bouy
4x 100 freestyle
1x 400 freestyle
Total time about 31 min
Oh yeah and my stupid shoulder blades/upper back is still killing me!

Sunday I sat in bed all day with a sinus infection feeling crappy, was gonna do the Singer Island Tri #3, but my body had other plans.

Saturday I was supposed to do a 5k right around the corner, but my bubs was feeling horrible, I was gonna push her in the stroller :( So I settled for an afternoon spin class.

Good News!

So a couple of good news tidbits today.
I found out that the girl that was in the accident is doing fine and expected to make a full recovery. Her aunt phoned me today to let me know. I was relieved to hear this, as I was a little traumatized by the whole thing. She ended up with a bruised kidney, a leaking liver (which they repaired), something screwed up with her foot or ankle (guess it got pinned), 8 staples by her knee and some cuts on her head. Her aunt said they were going to keep her in their for several more days to watch her liver and do more cat scans. She actually remembers me speaking to her at the crash and telling her to hang in there and stay with me. She said she thought she was gonna die and was so grateful to have someone there with her to comfort her and help her thru. This totally made my day. I am so glad that I was able to help her. She wants to speak with me so I am thinking I might stop in by the hospital and pay her a visit, because I know how boring it is just sitting around in that place (spent almost a month in there before I had my bubs).
My other good tidbit: I got registered for the Miami Man International Distance Triathlon in Miami. This is an awesome tri, as the run portion goes thru Metrozoo by all of the animals and the swim is in a really clear lake. The bike is also very flat :) This race has been sold out for 2-3 months now and they must have just released a few more spots, so yeah! This will be my next "big" race. I have a few sprint races planned in there, but this race will be my focus. As of now there are 20 Athena's signed up and my goal is to not be last! Gotta work on my run!
Saturday there is a 5k honoring a local fireman who passed away earlier in the year. My hubs has training in the morning, so I think I will take bubs to the race and push her in the stroller. Not to mention there is post race BBQ. Now if anyone knows how to throw a BBQ, its the fire department. And BBQ for breakfast sounds awesome. Not to mention the race doesn't start until 8 and its 5 minutes drive from my house :)
Also I got my breakdown from Sunday's race:
Swim: 13:26 (~253/283)
T1: 2:18
Bike: 45:33 (~233/283)
T2: 1:41
Run: 48:50 (283/283)
Total: 1:51:47
BTW this was the worst run time out of everyone! Pics aren't out yet, but very soon I'm sure!

Bad Accident!

So yesterday was just a freaked out day. My shoulders were still killing me from Sunday's rollabout in the surf, so I went to the chiro to get everything popped back into place. I had my daughter with me because she just had a terrible cough. We were leaving the chiro and going to meet one of my workers at the job when the car in front of me drifted into oncoming traffic and kaplowy! There were cars flying everywhere! I slammed on my brakes with every last bit of strength, braced the steering wheel for impact. Luckily all we caught was a headlight rolling under the truck.I immediately told my bubs to stay put & jumped out of the car & called 911.

I was so freaked out I had a really hard time telling dispatch where in the heck I was. Finally I pulled myself together and figured out where I was. I checked all 4 cars to see who was hurt. One car turned out to be parked, one vehicle the driver was pinned inside and couldn't get out, but he was awake and talking, another guy was ok and just dazed and lastly was this young woman in a green ford. When I first came up to her, she was unconscious. She had not been wearing her seatbelt and even though the airbag deployed, her head went thru the windshield. Her head was bleeding and her knee was badly cut.

After figuring out she was the worst and checking on my bubs, I went back to her to see if I could get her awake. I managed to get her to open her eyes a little and she spoke very softly. I couldn't understand her too well. I told her she was in a car accident and that help was coming very quickly. She asked my to please not leave her. I told her I wouldn't go anywhere until the paramedics arrived. I tried to open her door, but it was completely jammed. I got the passenger side open and tried to find a cell phone or something. I got the radio to turn off so at least I could hear her a little better. I asked her if there was anyone I could call for her before help arrived. I managed to get a # out of her, but I still didn't know her name or who I was calling. Of course I got an answering machine and I left this really cryptic frantic message about someone being badly hurt in a green ford and they gave me this number. Within a couple minutes they called me back. I put the phone on speakerphone and they were only able to exchange a couple words before the sirens were getting loud. I told them the hospital that she was probably gonna be taken too. she was semi-conscious but badly injured. Her eye was all bloodied in the whites, her head was bleeding, but I stopped that with my gym towel (sorry). When help arrived I backed off and let them work. They cut her windshield out and cut the drivers door off. I had already been and unlocked and opened the doors. I figured anything I could do to help in expediting her removal from the car. It was all very emotional. It turns out the woman I called owned the car and at first was a bit upset to hear that her car was completely totaled. When she realized how serious her friend was hurt, I think she stopped worrying about the car. She told me that only 10 minutes prior she was talking to her and the driver was telling her how tired she was and how badly she wanted to sleep. She told that she advised her to pull over and have a rest, but she wanted to press on and just get home. I think she had a long blink and drifted right into another vehicle. Each car was probably doing 40-45 mph so the collision was equivalent to hitting a wall at 80-90mph.
This accident reminds me of the time that I found a guy on the side of the road who was riding a bike in the rain at night and had been hit by a car. I will blog about that at another time, but it brought back those same feelings that I experienced that night7 years ago.

Tropical Tri Race Report

First off I just want to say - Wow I'm glad that's over!

Warning: this is a long post.

So I arrived on-site around 5:45am, with a race start of 7am. Needless to say, there wasn't a whole lot of people there yet, but they were starting to trickle in. Every single race I always bring a flashlight and have never needed it, so Murphy's Law would state that if I don't bring it, there will be no lights in transition. I went to pick up my packet & chip and then I got body marked. Grabbed my gear and headed to a totally unlit transition area. Now this is at a city beach and the transition area is in a city parking lot that has lights. The city is the main sponsor of the race. Do you think anybody planned ahead and had the lights set to turn on? Nope. Guess they are on a timer and the time says off at this time of the morning. After all it is sea turtle nesting season so they probably try to shut them off as soon as practical at night. So they hunted around but couldn't manage to get anyone that knew anything about them or how to get them going.
So I managed to find the Athena row and was thankful to see that it was almost to the end right where you come in from the swim, perfect! I have a hard time running with bare feet and was thankful to see it would be a short hop on pavement. So I managed to get myself set up reasonably well in the dark. Around 6:30 or so, the sun was starting to lighten up the sky, but the sun didn't rise until the swim start. After we got a little light, I double-checked by set-up, had a Gu Rocktane (love those things!) and a swig of gatorade and then headed down to the beach just across the street. Now because of all the storms over the past several years, our beach has been whittled away to nothing. You can pretty much walk down the steps and there is only 50 feet of beach at low tide. Now in the dark, the sound of the waves crashing was a bit intimidating. I had looked when I picked up my packet, but it was pitch black. Now that the sun was up, we could see that the ocean itself wasn't too bad, but the break was pretty daunting. I have never raced with seas like this.
I decided that I better have a hop in the water and figure out how to dive thru the waves and not look like a moron. So I get in the water around 6:45 and immediately realized it went from wet feet to waist deep in like a foot, then it stayed waist deep for about 10 feet, then there was a big sandbar for about another 10 feet where it was only ankle deep. Just after the sand bar is where the break was happening. I stood on the sandbar just watching some others warm up and got to see how they attached a 3' ripcurl coming at them. It was hard enough just standing there trying not to get swept in the with waves. It seemed easy enough, the successful ones just dove into it as it was curling before it completely crashed down. Perfect, now it was time for me to give it a go. After a couple trys I seemed confident enough that it wouldn't be too difficult. They had us swimming out a fair distance before we were to parallel the shore. It looked longer than a 1/4 mi and later the announcer said it was 3/8 mi, no biggie. So I swam around a bit and got loosened up. My shoulders seemed ok. I headed the dr's advice and rested it the last several days.
So we got called out of the water for the start. I was in wave 2, actually all the women were in wave 2 except relays and first-timers. There were only 4 waves. Attendance did seem down a bit from last year, but I don't think the race was published very well and in their infinite wisdom they decided to raise the fee to $80. I had written an email to the city because I was so pissed off about this. $80 for a sprint race in my backyard???? Are you kidding me? Well several others must have done the same because about 2 weeks later, they sent out a mass email announcing they were dropping the price to $60, so I signed up then. Also with all the storms that we've had, that probably kept a good bit of folks away too.
So the first wave lines up and I go down to the waters edge so I can see how the guys handle getting in. It was freaking hysterical! I guess not everyone warmed up in the water because several of the guys took one step and dove right in, only to take one stroke and be on their bellies! Now they had to get up and run another 10 feet and battle the waves and get in again. It was hilarious! So next the girls line up. There seemed to be alot of us, so I got towards the outside where it thinned out a bit and I was just behind the 1st row of people. When our waved started I went running out, high knees thru the surf! Got to the sand bar and kept my high knees going. Great here come a nice big swell, this is gonna make a huge wave. Sure enough! I dove in just before the break and popped out the other side. I look around and I am at the front of the wave. What the? So no time to gloat, here comes another wave. I dive thru again and pop out the other side in time to get slammed with a third wave and a giant mouth full of seawater. I had to stop and tread for a moment to hack up the water and watched as people started to blow past me, ugh. It was a good start until that stupid wave. So I managed to get myself together and start swimming. Visibility today was very poor. The sand was all stirred up, so I had to sight frequently to stay on track. Luckily the pack was not too far ahead and I used them to sight on. The swim went by pretty quick, I passed a few people along the way made it to the buoy and turned in. Now here is where the real fun began! As I was swimming to shore, you keep getting surged in and out, ugh. So I was kicking a bit for fiercely so I wouldn't lose ground as the water surged away from shore. I managed to pass a couple more people and I was right next to some other girl. All of a sudden I was swimming on top of a giant ripcurling wave and it just sucked me right under the water and tumbled be all over the place. Next to getting my regulator kicked out of my mouth in 90' of water, this was my scariest moment ever. And I am a water brat born and raised on the Florida beaches. Luckily I had just managed a breath and I held it while I got whirled about. I remember wondering how long it would last and which way was up. Yes it was scary. When it finally stopped, I stood up and I was only about 10' from shore, past the sand bar and in the waist deep water. My left calf had a major cramp, my right toes were cramped and my right shoulder was going all spasm. The girl that was next to me, I don't know if she got taken for the same ride or what, but she took one look at me and asked if I was okay. I said yeah just cramped up a bit. As I tried to hobble towards shore on one leg, the waves just kept coming... hard. I got thrashed around a bit more, but nothing like the washing machine ride I just had. I got out of the water and had to walk up the sand, my leg & shoulder were dying. I looked down at my watch 12:00. Awesome! Finally the cramp worked it self out and I jogged over to my bike.
So I swap gear and get out on the bike. As I got to the mount line, one of the first guys in the wave behind me caming flying up with his bike and he was going to mount it while in a full on run. I thought, wow this will be cool to watch, and it was. As he swung his leg, his seat came flying off, but not the seat post. His seat flew forward and knocked his aerobottle out too, so he was just leaving a trail of parts. Now that would of really hurt if he had managed to get mounted on only his seat post! I'm not sure what happened to him, cause I didn't stick around to find out. There is a really nice little downhill at the start, but then it goes right into the lake worth bridge. It's not a small bridge, but its not too bad. I got over that and then we had to turn and do 2 loops down the main road that cut across downtown. It was supposed to be 11 miles, but Mr. Garmin says it was 12.5! So the bike took me about 45:00 with an average speed of 16.7. My speed on the flats was pretty good. I think it was about 16mph going into wind and 19mph with the wind.
So back into transition and out for the run. The run was okay. My shoulder was really killing by this point. Spending alot of time on the aerobars did not help things. Just about every time I jostled my feet, it stabbed thru my shoulder blade. Yes I will be going to see chiro tomorrow so he can stick that rib back into place and my massage guy is off til wed, but I'll be seeing him then. The run course was okay. There were 4 water stops, which was great because the temps were in the low 90's this morning. The run leaves the beach, goes over the bridge and thru a park, snakes around a block of houses and then back thru a parking lot and back over the bridge and back to the beach. It came out to 2.9 miles. It's kinda weird but when you come down the bridge you have to sorta double back to the right to go under the bridge to get to the park. There were 2 other girls running down the bridge with me and they blew right by the turn. I gave them a shout and they turned around and came under the bridge. They both thanked me because they would have been off running into downtown and no one is there. The one girl was complaining they should have had a volunteer there, but it was marked on the ground and they did give us a hand-out in the packet explaining the run course. If you weren't familiar with the course, at least read your hand-out.
So I finished the run in around 51:00. I never saw my official time, but if we were 4 min behind wave 1, then I should be around 1:52. I'll post my numbers when they get them on-line. So I hung around a bit and went over to check the board to see if I could find my time and there wasn't anyone listed in the Athena. Weird. Well I realized that these times were obviously cut off somewhere around 1:37 so when they bring out the next batch it should be on there. Well the next batch never came. So I decided to stay for the awards, because who knows, I could be 3 of 3 again :) I was standing next to another Athena who recognized me from Singer Island a few weeks back. She too decided to wait and see what happens. Of course they wait until about dead last to call the Athenas, and guess what, I got 3rd place! Yeah me. I'm not sure how many people were in our group, but my guess is 3, but 3rd is 3rd. The girl next to me got 2nd. She said she hoped to see me next weekend at the last Singer Island race. Well I guess that will depend on my shoulder :) and the seas :)

Pre-race ramblings

Well it's very early in the am here, got up around 4:20 to get ready for the Tropical Triathlon today. Yesterday the ocean was looking remarkably well for a hurricane swirling out there, so hopefully this morning will be the same. Today is a sprint race: 1/4 mi swim, 11 mi bike, 3.1 mi run. I am hoping to break 1:40 cause the course is pretty flat except for one semi-tall bridge and few small "hills". I've been run focused lately so I am hoping that is where I pick up my extra time and maybe a little off the swim. I don't expect my bike to be better than 42 min, so we'll see how it goes.
We went to our the season's first home opener of Florida Atlantic Football (my undergrad school). We didn't have a football team when I was there, but they do now and its nice to go out and support them. They actually won the Sunbelt conference last year and got to go to a bowl game, youngest team to ever manage that feat! The game was great, but it started at 4pm and it was 96+ degrees out, those poor fellows had to be roasting! We won against UAB (Univ of Alabama Birmingham). It was an exciting game and its nice to see lots of people coming out to watch. Little bub's got a neat football jersey because they were giving them out for youth day. Of course it won't fit her for 2-3 years but she is quite happy wearing it anyways.
OK well I gotta load the car for the 20 min haul down the road, I will be back with a race report, as well as one for Chicago two weeks ago.

What the? My fastest outside run? Pathethic, I know

Oh its been a rough week. Chicago was a great race, with the exception of the roads. I will have a full race report in a day or so when I can get around to getting all my thoughts on paper. Bottom line is that I finished in 4:17 (ugh), but I finished strong and felt really good.
So I have continued to train. Sunday I rode on my bike for 2:00 in some nasty wind. There was a hurricane passing by and we had many passing showers, lots of wind and some really knarly surf. I only saw 2 other roadies out the entire time, normally I would see easily 50+ on a weekend day! Monday I ran 2 miles at a 16:00 min pace and tonight I did 2 more miles at a 15:00 pace, which is my fastest time outside that has been recorded on my Garmin :))))))

So we lucked out with Gustav staying away, we lucked out with Hanna staying away, none of us are feeling very good about Ike though. It is a damn scary looking storm and darn it, I have a race here on Sunday! We can't swim in the 8 foot seas that we've been having this week.

So this Sunday is the Tropical Triathlon, its a sprint race at the beach with a very big bridge stuck right in the middle of the bike and the run. It has been really hard to get back into the groove. I have been having some pain in my shoulder blades and today I finally had to go see chiro. Turns out I am having some muscle spasms in some muscle that is pulling on my ribs and giving me sharp stabbing pains, ouch! Funny because I can run, bike and lift weights, but I can't sit down in my car without screaming, go figure. So I got some electrical stim and heat put on it and then he popped my ribs or something back into place and I spent the rest of the day free of stabbing pains, but very sore from whatever he did. Tonight I am feeling a bit better and hopefully tomorrow I will be back on the road to feeling great. I have laid off the pushups for a bit because of this pain and now I am gonna have to put my pull-ups on the shelf for a little while so I can rest that muscle. So tomorrow evening I am really hoping to get a swim in. All for now :)

Chicago bound

So we escaped anything major from Tropical Storm Fay. We just got a TON of rain and a little bit of wind. All the schools were shut but reopened today. We are leaving for Chicago tomorrow! Gotta pack tonight & I won't be able to sleep because I am just toooooo excited! I swam in my wetsuit at the gym's pool last night. Its not the most comfortable experience, but it definitely kept me cozy and it definitely has positive buoyancy! I think I was actually a bit quicker in the water too. I just did a short swim as I am trying to keep things low key this week so I know my body will be 100% on Sunday, I was also roasting in the wetsuit!
Tomorrow will be a fun flight as we get to fly through our friend Fay. She plans on hanging around Florida for a bit, she'll probably still be here when we come back too. I like to fly, but I hate bumpy flights!
Well it's time to get packing. I am hoping I have time to sneak in a short run tonight, so we'll see.

Fell off the horse

Well today was not such a great day. I fell off the healthy eating/good calorie control bandwagon and then got run over by a mack truck, ugh! It was ugly today. Let's have a recap, shall we? Maybe writing it down will help me to avoid this in the future! Had my usual wheat free cereal for breakfast (not too bad). Had half a turkey sub for lunch (still not too bad). Also had honey mustard pretzels, a cherry turnover, more pretzels, a few tortilla chips, a bite of peanut butter, some orange milano cookies (yum) and some other stuff that is eluding me at the moment. For dinner I had my low fat version of mexican pizza, so that wasn't too bad. So the weather was super crappy today and I felt super crappy because of it. I had a splitting headache the entire day and just felt lousy, I'd like to think it was all the junk I ate making me feel bad, but I am guessing it was the weather. Why do I think that eating will make me feel any better???
So tonight I decided to go to the gym and work some of this crap off me, because I was doing pretty good and the scale was headed in the right direction for a while. So I spent 35 min on the dreadmill. For the first time in my life (ever) when I ran at 5 mph and it actually felt kind of slow. What???? Yes I actually wasn't dying at 5 mph and thought if I wasn't doing speed intervals tonight, I could have stayed there for a while. So I managed to interval my way from 5.0, 5.2, 5.4, ... up to 6.6! I told myself that I would do a 1 min sprint and then 2 min recovery. If I hit a HR of 175 I could stop before the 1 min was up. So I did pretty good. I didn't start to get close to 175 until I was up over 6.0. My knee felt pretty good, but just for good measure it will be ice and advil before bed :)
So after my running, I decided on doing some weight training. My main focus tonight was my upper body, because my legs got a good beating while running. So I eeked out several assisted pull-ups and dips, I did 60# on the chest press & lat pull down. Curled 65# on the bicep curl, 50# on the tricep extension, 50# on the seated row, 70# on the hip adduction/abduction, 55# on the fly/reverse fly and 110# on the seated leg press. I don't think there was anything else. So overall I had a calorie burn of 620 in 1:15. Not bad for it being a crappy day overall.
So tomorrow is more of the same crap. My workers are off tomorrow because the weather is supposed to be quite nasty. All of the schools are closed from 2 counties south to 3+ counties north of us. They don't like the buses running in that stuff. So no pre-school for my little one tomorrow. Today was her first day and she says she has a good time. About 16 kids in her class, mostly boys. She'll feel right at home bossing them around, lol. Most of her little friends are boys anyways. Her teacher said she did fine, so that was reassuring to hear. You can't help worry a little bit about how they will act/fit in with others. She has never really been around that many kids at once, and the few times she was, she was totally shy.
So today was laundry day around here. Worried that the power is gonna fail tomorrow, as it always does when we get just a little bit of wind. Every time we have a tropical storm or hurricane, it seems to be out for anywhere from a few hours up to a week! Yes a week without any power is a loooooong time. So we brought the generator home and fired it up so we are ready to roll if it happens. I had to make sure all of my stuff was washed and ready for packing, I can't believe that the Chicago Triathlon is here already! The weather forecast is calling for partly cloudy skies, a high of 80 and a low of 60. So the low of 60 will suck if I am in an early wave, but the high of 80 will be a nice change from the 90+ weather that I have been training in.
OK I'm off to bed now, feeling pretty beat and headache is coming back.

Final prep

Well today was our last official day of team training with "Team In Training". I borrowed my best friend's road bike and cranked out 25 miles, even had to borrow her shoes. Luckily we were close in size, but they were a bit small! It was a good ride, felt okay. It was nice to finish training in under 2 hours and get home as everyone was getting up. Kind of sad that this was our last session together. Maybe next year I will join up with them again, but next time I will be much quicker :) One can only hope that I can get quicker, hehe.
So Tropical Storm Fay is lumbering in this general direction. The computer models that forcast its track are literally all over the place. They show the thing striking anywhere from Naples to New Orleans. Who knows. I haven't done anything to prepare for it. We don't need shutters, we have a generator, so I guess all I need to do is bring the stuff in from outside, strap down the boat & fill up all the gas tanks. And that is if it only shifts its course towards us tonight, but as of now we are outside "the cone".
Little one starts pre-school tomorrow. That is a happy/sad day for mommy as my baby is growing up! I am hoping I can get into the habit of dropping her off and then hitting the gym right afterwards. Hopefully that plan will come to fruition. My knee is still hurting a little bit so I will probably go see the doc this week and have him take a look. I really don't want to do any damage running 6 miles next week, so it may revert to a walk. Yesterdays run did feel really good, but I am not digging the pain afterwards...
Week 2 pushup challenge got off to a slow start. I did Day 1 today with no problem. I maxed out at 20 on the last set :) I think after I get thru it, I will repeat the program, but doing "proper" pushups instead of on the knees ;)
This will be a busy week. Trying to get work tied up, dealing with tropical systems and getting all my crap packed and ready for Chicago. Can't wait!

No time for hurricanes!

So today was our last swim training before our big event next weekend. We swam 1500 yds non-stop and then hopped out of the pool and ran 3 miles. I must say it was a very good session. I think the time off this week has helped alot. At first my legs felt like lead, but after 5 min or so my legs felt fresh and ready to rock. I pretty much kept on a 3:1 ratio (3 min run, 1 min walk) and it felt really good. I forgot my Garmin today so I have no idea what my pace was, but it was quicker than usual. The swim was really good, it felt like I had a couple of those Ah-hah moments in the pool where you catch the water just right or have a couple of really good lengths and then the moment is gone :( Water temps in chicago are looking promising for next weekend: upper 60's to low 70's. I will be wearing a sleeveless wetsuit, but at least I won't be freezing in it!
I was really bummed out today to learn that the Miami Man Triathlon registration is full :( Really wanted to do that race but dilly-dally'd to long I guess. Oh well it's in November and that is the start of run season anyways. I really want to focus on improving my swim technique and running better this winter. I also plan on weight training 4x a week. The pushup challenge and doing assisted pull-ups at the gym has really improved my upper body strength. I can feel a difference swimming anyways!
So tonight we had dinner at a Brazilian steakhouse. It was awesome. If you have never been, it is quite different. You have something on your table to signal the waiters "bring on the food!". The "waiters" walk around with skewers of meat and cut it at your table for you. They have all different types of stuff: pork, chicken, beef (sirloin, filet, flank, etc), alligator, ribs, etc. You keep eating and they keep coming.
Tomorrow is our last biking practice. I borrowed my best friend's Jamis road bike and will be riding that at practice. Also we have a Tropical Storm (potential hurricane) headed in this general direction, so it will be breezy winds out of the Northeast tomorrow. Hopefully the storm will head elsewhere, but we will still get rain and wind from it! Luckily rain not coming til later on Monday, only isolated showers tomorrow!
Our daughter was supposed to be having a sleepover with grandma today, but now she got tired and had a mommy meltdown. DH is on his way to get her, ughhh, will she ever get over this?
So I am off to bed before they get back home cause I've got an early day tomorrow.

Happy B-Day

So today was my DH's b-day. Baddddd calorie day as we had Cheesecake Factory for dinner. I think typing that cost me another 100 calories! Oh it was good too :) I'm sure it will get worked off over the next couple of days. Our coach warned us to expect a rough workout this weekend, so I am thinking.... great.... just what I need. Funny we have having bike training on Sunday too yet hardly any of us have bikes! Everyone just dropped them off yesterday for shipping. We have been told to beg or borrow a bike for Sunday. Personally I don't think its a good idea because we have not been properly fit to that bike and could risk an injury training on a bike that is not properly set up. So needless to say I fear our coach and have borrowed my best friend's bike. Who am I to argue with success right? I can't imagine we will be having a long ride, but it is our last team training day together.
So my knee is feeling much better! Kudos to Dr. Fox for keeping me up & running. He told me to just keep it on ice and wait a couple days. Feeling back to normal today so I am excited that I will be able to run a little tomorrow (did I actually just say that, "I am excited to run", wow!). But yes I am. Allergies have been driving me crazy this past month!!!! I feel like I am literally going to sneeze my head off! I have been totally lax this week and done 0 training. Yeah 0, nada. Ouch.
Okay we are having a sleepover at our house tonight and the kiddo's are driving me crazy so I gotta cut it short.

Oh my aching knee :(

So this past weekend I had a sprint tri on Saturday and then Sunday our coach had us do a 35 mile bike ride. That bike ride sucked soooooo bad and I normally love being out on my bike. We did this same route last weekend too. The last 10 miles were shear hell. I actually stopped after 29 miles and just pulled over to the sidewalk for a bit to stretch my legs and have a little break. Ughh, I didn't want to forge ahead, but I was already behind my group because I was just out for an endurance ride, not a speedy ride. Avg speed was around 15.5 mph
So monday morning I get up and my left knee is just aching. I don't normally have knee trouble, but it was really bothering me to bend it. I just get all kind of foot issues (orthotics did wonders for my feet). So yesterday was a bit depressing because I was hoping to get a run in. Today is just as depressing because it is still aching :( I called my sports med dr and he told me to just ice it for a couple days and come on in if it is still misbehaving after that.
So I think tonight my plan will be a nice swim in the super chlorinated gym pool and some upper body weights. I start week 2 of the one-hundred push-ups tonight. I still do them girly style, but I can manage about 5 "real" ones.
My diet has been okay for the past few days. My calories have pretty much been in range, but the quality of food, not as good as I'd like.
Tomorrow my precious little road bike gets dropped off to get shipped to Chicago for my upcoming race. Very excited, but mildly concerned because of my knee. This was to be my last real training week before I cut back for the race. Oh well, time will tell I guess.
Rough a$$ day at work today, just too many things too deal with and it makes putting myself first very difficult. Also tomorrow is my daughters orientation for school, I will probably be in tears! My baby is starting pre-school. We got all her school supplies and uniforms and she is ready to go. Every day she asks if she is going to school, how long is that gonna last, hehe!

Loggerhead Race Report

Ok the down & dirty first:
3/8 mi swim: 12:20 (raging fast current out there!)
T1: 3:22
13 mi bike: 48:13 (bike felt horrible today)
T2: 1:24
3.1 mi "run": 50:22
Total: 1:55
Temperature was 87 degrees, felt like 120 degrees in the sun!
Alright so I got there an hour early and could not find a parking spot! Ughh. After 15 minutes of driving around, I finally parked illegally at the end of row, but I figured people were filling in every free patch of grass so what the heck.
Made the short stroll to transition, cause hey if I'm gonna park illegally I might as well park close :) Got my body marked, picked up my chip and set up my stuff. Met up with some fellow TNTers and chatted briefly. By now, its like 20 minutes before race start and I'm not even to the beach yet to warm up. Great start already I know. So of course, nature calls and I really need to use the potty, but of course the line is reallllllly long and there is no way I will make it. Yeah so that made for a really long race.
So there were 600 people signed up and I was wave 3 of 5. Our wave was pretty small: women 19 & under, 45 & over and my category: athena (short for slow (but fit), slightly overweight (but fit), very determined chics). So I managed to get in about a 10 minute warmup, because the start was gonna be a little late. The swim started out good, until i got hung up trying to get around the first buoy. Remember that ripping current I mentioned. Yeah well the thrash-fest was all pushed into the buoy and of course i get hung up on the line cause I can't even swim, I've got to tread water and eek my way out of this mess. So I am sure that hurt my time a bit. After I was free, we had a nice long straight run with the current. I was rocking it out and passing people, it was great :) And for once, they put the transition mats at the swim exit! But of course its only a short jog to the bikes, so go figure. I wore my new heart rate monitor (since its water resistant to 50m) and my heart rate was 175 at the swim exit! So coach can't say I wasn't pushing hard enough!
So I got to transition and was happy to see some of my fellow faster teammates getting their bikes ready. Wow I must of been right behind them, turns out I was only 30 sec behind getting out of the water! Yeah I was happy with that :) I think coach was happy too, because I got a slightly surprised "good job jen!".
So I got my shoes on and ran out of transition. Now the bike is my favorite and I do ok for someone over 200#. My average speed usually works out to 16.5-17 mph. Well I don't know what my body was doing, but my avg speed was closer to 16. There wasn't really any wind to blame, and figuring out my speed, I sure didn't feel that quick. I just felt like I really struggled. I managed to keep my heart rate hovering in the 160's.
So I get back for the run and make a really quick transition (for me anyways) and off to the run. So I started out quicker than usual, a good sign for coming off a sucky bike. Lots of water on the course too - thank you race director! By the way the race director is in China for the Olympics cause I think he is one of the docs for the tri team. He was trying to setup a link so the USA tri team could start the race remotely, but unfortunately it didn't work out. Our local guy that wins all the races around here, his sister is on the women's tri team for the usa. Her name is Laura Bennett. She comes from the Reback family that seems to just have athletics in their blood! Congrats to John Reback for an outstanding race today with #1 overall and a time of 56:54. Phenomenal! So anyway, I digress. So I finish the run in about 50 min. My run felt better than normal, I did more running than usual too. Singer Island a few weeks ago, I walked almost the entire course (and it wasn't a full 5k)!
So some guy yelled at me to stay to the right, but I was to the right of the traffic lane, just not all the way over into the crappy bike lane. The bike lane was full of gravel, bits of cars, etc. Of course he passes me and goes over into the bike lane and drafts behind someone for as long as I can see. There was alot of drafting going on, I'm not sure what the refs were looking at, but it wasn't people drafting.
So what had to be the highlight of the race was being passed about 200 yards from the finish by a 7 year old... yes I make no mistake here, a 7 year old. Did I mention that, I am assuming her dad, was running next to her... pushing a 4 seat stroller, yes 4 seats and they were all full! So I looked up the results and (wait for it) she comes from the family of athletes! Yes she is a Reback, destined for athletic fame and Olympic glory. So now I feel much better, haha. I saw the dad at last years Run for Pies 4 miler on Turkey Day. He also passed me then pushing the monster stroller, only the kids were much smaller then, hehe.
All for now, gotta shower and go eat pancakes. HRM says I burned over 1,600 calories and I am gonna get some back at IHOP :)
Oh yeah my workout summary says I hit a max HR of 206! I am pretty sure this was at the finish when I started to really book it! Its uploading into Motionbased now, so I'll know my speed very shortly. My average pace was 16:27, which is my best yet after a bike and swim. My speed at the finish was 7 mph so I am sure that is when my HR went thru the roof! Overall though my HR was around 86-90% of Max, so I was certainly pushing myself.
Well nerves are starting up already for this Chicago race. Ughh. We got one more day of bike training with coach and i am certain he will make it memorable and painful! After that I will have to start going back to spin to keep those legs moving!
Ok reallllly hungry now. Will post pics when they come up.

Gettin ready to race

So tomorrow I've got the Loggerhead Sprint Tri in Jupiter. I've gotta go for packet pickup this afternoon. Luckily I got this to coincide with a job I need to check out, so that works well. So tonight I will gather my gear, have a good dinner and get to bed early. Shouldn't be a problem cause I had to get up early to wait in line at the building department (before they opened). You'd think they were handing out free money or something?!?!
The guys are still working away on my pool & deck. It's almost demo'd, yeah! I gotta post a pic of the guys working, cause they are just too funny! Our bikes get shipped out to Chicago next week :( Guess I'll be breaking out my hardtail to ride.
Oh yeah down another pound today, oh happy day :))))))

Well the Loggerhead Triathlon is upon us. Saturday morning is the day, Jupiter is the place :) Our coach is using this as a tune-up for our bigger event, The Chicago Triathlon, in 3 weeks! Excited to say that we now have our plane tickets for Chicago, we just need to sort out some lodging details and we'll be good to go. My daughter is so excited about going on another trip!
So I had good intentions of working out today, but my day has just completely slipped by me. I did however treat myself to a new toy, you know how us triathletes (don't you just love that) love our little gadgets! Well I got a Polar F6 heart rate monitor. It's pink :) Its also water resistant to 50m, not waterproof though. I can use it for pool swimming, but should avoid snorkeling with it, go figure. Anyways it's pretty cool because I can program in my height, weight, age & gender, so it will actually calculate my calorie burn for me. I put it on just over 2 hours ago and I have just been puttering around the house and ran a couple errands and I have burned a whopping 291 calories. I just love working out. As I sit here and type this, my heart rate is only 63, awesome :) Of course not to awesome a calorie burn, but thats ok. I want to find my resting heart rate for when I am sleeping, so it should be quite interesting sleeping with that band around me. yeah...
So tomorrow afternoon we have packet pickup and the expo for saturday's race. I can't wait to see my cool shirts, as I have never done loggerhead before and I know they always have great shirts. Why else would I race right? We do it for the swag, I know. So triathlon season is sadly coming to an end in about 6 weeks and we will soon be into running season.

My remaining race wish list for the year:
8/17 - Singer Island Sprint Tri (this is a maybe, might do fat-tire since I won't have my bike, its being shipped out next week to chicago)
8/24 - Accenture Chicago International Distance Tri
9/7 - Tropical Tri (Sprint)
9/21 - Miami SS Triathlon
10/12 - Wellington Horse Country 10 miler or Disney's Race for the Taste 10k, hmmm
10/19 - Race the Troops Sprint Tri @ Tradewinds
10/26 - Either Space Coast Century Ride
11/9 - Miami Man International Tri
11/16 - 13.1 Fort Lauderdale ??
11/27 - Run for the Pies 4 miler
12/7 - Marathon of the Palm Beaches 1/2 Marathon
12/7 - Kids In Distress Inlet Challenge Cycle Ride - Metric Century


Ok off to crash now, can hear the thunder rolling in outside :(

Busy Weekend!

Today's workout:
35 mile bike ride: 2:20 min
3 mile run: 45 min

So today was awesome, I blasted 3,100 calories this morning! This was our last big training weekend before our upcoming triathlon in Chicago. Next week we have a tune-up sprint tri and then we will start to "taper".

So today we did a 35 mile bike ride (2,800 calories!) followed up with a 45 minute run (300 or so calories). All of this was followed up by a nice plate of blueberry pancakes and syrup, which probably negated my great calorie burn :)

The morning wasn't looking too good though. When I got up it was thundering and by the time I had to load my bike it was pouring down rain. I looked at the radar and it looked like it was headed right where I was going. But I was already up and I just can't get back to sleep once I'm upright, so I figured this is our last tough weekend and maybe the weather will cooperate. Worst case, we would all end up at Starbucks or breakfast if we didn't ride.

So I made the 30 min drive up there and when I arrived, everyone was sort of sitting around waiting on the coach to arrive and no one had unloaded their bikes yet. So coach rolls in a little late and says we're going and we'll probably get wet on the ride back. So low and behold, the weather stays really nice and overcast for most of our ride. Our ride started out with the normal 16-18 mph warmup for 5 miles, then they love to kick it into gear. If they do 20 mph I can hang, but past that I just can't handle. Well today they decided that 22-23 mph would be a good pace (and no there was NO wind). Well I managed to hang for about 2-1/2 miles before my heart wanted to beat out of my chest. So I ever so casually swung out to the left and dropped off the line :)

Of course we get back for the run and sun has come out and is heating everything up. A couple people on our team totally ran out of steam. One girl had to be picked up she was so beat. I think alot of them hadn't ridden that long a distance in a while (or ever) and hadn't fueled properly while we were out. It feels kinda "easy" riding the bike (as compared to running) and it is harder to fuel up, cause you sorta need to stop to suck down a gu or pack some stuff in your back pockets, but I don't think anyone but a couple of us bothered to keep gel'ing. I had one powergel and a 1/2 pack of sports beans. I got back from the bike and had a great slow run. The heat was killer, but I usually double-suck at running coming off the bike after a ride that long, but I was happy. I think 6 miles would have been doable today, but we were only doing 45 minutes.
All in all, it was a good training weekend.

Oh yeah I forgot to mention yesterday that it was the first time ever that I was I able to do pull-ups on the assisted pull-up machine! Yeah I did about 5. I also did the assisted tricep dip, but I can manage to always get a couple on that. Of course I had the weight offset on the machine set to the maximum :) Still I have NEVER been able to do a pull-up on this machine, I was so excited :)

Today's AM Swim workout:
4 x 100 yd warm-up
600 yd race pace (13:35)
3 x 200 yd
2 x 400 yd

Was really tired today, was a rough week of work, but got thru the swim okay.

Also did
30 min on elliptical
Ran 1 mile in 13:35
45 min of weight training

Was trying to make up for some of the bad crap that I ate towards the end of the week. Back up with my good eating habits now. Only 3 weeks to the Chicago Tri, I am nervous but excited.

My pool demo project is going okay. There is only a little more left to fill in, but now I have to work on busting off the top edge of the pool and the remaining deck. It's just been so hot! Can't believe how much sweat you can produce in 15 minutes slinging a shovel. After 3 hours of it, it gets pretty old and your hands hurt, hehe.

All for now, I'm beat and I have an early brick tomorrow. Coach is threatening extra cycling miles tomorrow :( We are already doing 30 miles and then running 4 miles afterwards, ughh.

I hate running :)

Just wanted to share that... Wondering if I will ever get any quicker... Wondering if running 3 miles non-stop will EVER happen (or one mile or two miles, at 5mph or quicker)... Wondering if it will ever feel any easier... Wondering how in the heck I am gonna do 6.2 miles after swimming a mile and biking 26 :)
Just alot of wondering going on today... Nerves starting to get to me I guess.
Well I actually lifted weights on Tuesday and I can tell that its been a while, because I am actually still a bit sore. My arms are still hurting and my legs from doing the hip abductor/adductor thingy. Gonna shoot for 2 days of weights just now and keep with my running/biking/swimming. Got another sprint race coming up the weekend after next and it would be so nice to not suck so bad at the run and be 3rd from last to finish :) Of course the big bridge scared off alot of inexperienced people last weekend, at least thats what I tell myself, hehe.
So don't think I mentioned that we are filling in out crappy old 45+ year old pool in the back yard. It was 7 feet deep of useless space. Too deep to ever get warm enough to use. Too deep to walk out more than 3 feet from the steps. Too many cracks all over the place to keep the water in. Too many things wrong with it. The hurricane destoryed the screen patio. It is in such a bad spot and we have no back yard. So we decided 6 months ago to fill it in and break up the deck and grass over it. So fast forward 6 months, I must like to wait til it gets to the hottest time of the year to work outside! So my guys that work for us are a little slow this week, since we are between jobs waiting for the next one to start. So 3 of them have been here like little troopers, jack-hammering, shoveling, digging, scooping, sweating... It is coming along, slooooooowly. The main top pieces have been removed from the screen and the sides are still in place since there is still techincally water in the pool. I just hope that my guys don't quit ;) I mean it is realllllly hot outside.
Well I guess that is enough ranting for one afternoon.
Oddly enough I will be running tonight, hoping for 4-5 miles, preferably outside instead of the dreadmill, but I guess that depends on if the rain is going to stay away or not.

Reward if found!

Lost: my motivation. If found please return immediately! Big reward if found promptly.
So I just am not feeling it today :(
I'm not sure my. Probably the crappy sleep I've gotten the last 2 nights has alot to do with it. I haven't really watched TV since ? Maybe I will turn the boob tube on and put that plasma to some use. I've been staying in my calorie allowance, I've been drinking my water, I've been eating healthy, I'm staying off the wheat, I'm exercising, and today I just feel like I am dragging. Well I have cut back on the caffiene too, but that was not intentional, I just don't keep soda in the house anymore and I haven't been eating any fast food lately, so only a little bit of coffee here and there. Who knows.
So tonight went to the gym after Bubba feel asleep, I feel less guilt that way :) I got in 30 minutes of weight training and almost a 30 minute swim. I was just not up for a swim today. Maybe my body is still recovering from the beating that it got over the weekend, yeah that's it. Hopefully a good nights sleep will do the trick.
Gluten free diet is going good, getting more used to what to make. Haven't eaten out a single meal since Friday night, which is unheard of in this house! Plus side of the diet is that it's cut down on DH's evening gas output ;)
Tomorrow I am gonna try to run again and Thursday I am hoping for an after work ride over at my LBS. Supposed to be a group going out for a 25 miler. That would be great. And one of these days I would like to get caught up on my work so I can have a little more free time. If I couldn't type fast, I would never have time to blog and this is really great mental therapy, hehe.

Riviera Beach/Singer Island Triathlon

So I had my 3rd ever sprint triathlon today. It was in Riviera Beach. It consisted of a 1/4 mi open water swim in the Atlantic Ocean, a long transition run to the bikes, a 10 mi bike (over a very tall fixed bridge) and a 3 mi run (also over that same darn bridge).

So I got there on time and picked up my packet & chip. Got body marked and brough all my stuff over to transition to set up. I ran into several people that I know through Team In Training (we are like roaches, we're everywhere!). Also so my old tri coach from last season, and the other tri coach from the Jupiter team. There were a few people from my current team there as well, so that helps.

So I set up my stuff and headed down to the ocean for some warm-up swimming. The water was crystal clear, and flat with a gentle roll. I was looking at the bouys thinking that I must be swimming way to much because this course looked aweful short. So after about 15 minutes of warmup, I headed over towards the starting area and noticed there is now an additional big yellow bouy (the other two were big orange one) and one additional small orange buoy. So now I am totally confused and wondering where the heck do we turn in. Then I thought, what am I thinking, like I am gonna be leading the pack, hehe, I will just be following the thundering flailing heard into the water and follow the lead group. So anyways just before the 1st wave goes off, the announcer points out that we are to turn in after passing the yellow buoy and the small orange one is not theres (probably a crab trap or something). So okay that clears up my confusion, but I guess not everyone heard the message, well everyone but one heard the message. The guy that comes to these local races and constantly kicks the crap out of everyone apparently just flew by the yellow buoy and headed towards the trap. The announced was utterly speechless. Turns out this guy swam ?? additional yards to some other buoy and still beat all the guys out of the water and still won overall by a comfortable margin. Can you say... wow?

So on to my swim. So my swim went okay. I am way more comfortable in the water now and I swam the course without stopping. I wish they would stick the freakin matts at the water exit though. It kills me that I finish about middle of the pack and then get passed by all these people running towards transition because I just can't run very well barefoot or just after swimming my butt off. But anywho, the swim was great and it was off to the bike.

So my bike started out reallllly well. I was blowing by all those people that ran past me to transition. I was cooking at over 20 mph for a bit, once we hit the turnaround, I must of been getting tired and a little wind must of been there because I dropped down to around 17-18 mph. Then with 2 miles to go, the dreaded bridge. Aghhh, I hate this bridge. It is right by the port and its fixed so its verrrrrrry tall. Of course they make us go over this at the end of our ride and then stop immediately at the bottom to u-turn and go back over, double aghhhhh. So I suffer over the bridge and I am not happy with what it had done to my awesome average speed, but thats life. So I speed down the other side with about 1/2 mi to transition and I hit 33.3 mph at the bottom, sweeeeeeet! I love speeeeeed.

So I blow into transition, rack the bike, change my shoes and head out to run, or in the case of today, walk. Yes its sadly pathetic, but I walked most of the course. I was tooo spent and it wa already over 90 degrees and the sun was blazing. I was wondering why I even signed up for this agony, then a few fellow slow pokes reminded me... because most other people are still at home in their beds and you are out here getting healthy and trying to improve your life. I love my fellow triathletes, they are truly a very supportive bunch! They are the ones that keep me going. I also saw some of my cycle buddies that had stopped to watch and cheer (thanks guys!).

So now to the crappy numbers :)
1/4 mi swim: 11:44
T1: 4:22
10 mi bike: 35:28 (16.9 mph)
T2: 1:38
3 mi run: 51:35 (cringe)
Total: 1:44

I was 237 of 240 finishers, but I was 3rd in the Athena group (but there was only 3 of us).
I even got a cool little award plaque, now sad is that, hehe.

By contrast, my sprint race in April, the FAU Wellness Triathlon, my times were:
Keep in mind there was no giant bridge at this race, so I guess I have shown improvement if you factor that in.
1/4 mi swim: 13:42
T1: 3:47
10 mi bike: 34:14
T2: 1:44
3 mi run: 52:04 (cringe)
Total: 1:45

At my sprint race 2 weeks ago in Fort Lauderdale, my times were:
3/8 mi swim: 20:34 (50% longer swim and it was over a 1/4 mi run to transition, my swim was only 14 min or so)
T1: 2:56
10 mi bike: 34:07 (17.6 mph, 2/7 in group)
T2: 2:38
3 mi run: 51:52 (cringe)
Total: 1:52

So needless to say, the Chicago Tri should be alot of fun :) my goal is 3:30 or less, sad I know.

Day 3 of Gluten Free, hey that rhymes

So today was day 3 of being gluten free. I guess its not as hard as I thought it was gonna be. Of course your body decides its gonna crave everything it can't have and you will go running around like mad trying to find an acceptable substitute. Why do our brains do that to us?? So I bought some brown rice pasta, it was actually quite... the same. Imagine that... I also got some brown rice bread, which I think was mislabeled. I think it should have read "very expensive brown rice brick", as it weighed 1-1/2 pounds for a very small loaf and cost over $5.00. I tried the bread toasted and it taste remarkably like .... toast, only not quite as tasty, but not bad.

For those of you unfamiliar with gluten-free, it is basically anything with wheat, barley, rye. So no cookies, cakes, breads, rolls, pizza (boo-hoo), pasta. I am doing this because I believe it will make me feel better. I have a sneaky suspicion that I have a gluten intolerance (and you too mom!). So from now until race day next month, I will give it a try. I can eat any of the following: meat, chicken, fresh fruit & veg, rice, gatorade & gu (thank god). Sounds remarkably healthy! Well I can also eat: ice cream, popsicles, pudding, etc. But I am also trying to limit my sugar intake. It's amazing that 3 days of cutting back on sugar and I hardly crave anything sweet. Now all I need is a good nights sleep. Oh yeah I still need to post my race report from yesterday, very exciting stuff.

The swim that wouldn't end!

Well we had swim training this am and our coach had us swim 3,000 yards. Did I mention that we did this without stopping! I think my time was around 1:15, which I was pretty darn happy with. I was close to the last one finished, but I wasn't far behind some others. Some day I will figure out what I am doing wrong with my stroke...

It was funny, I got in the pool and I must of missed the part about what we were doing. We were getting ready to push off and I was like, well what are we swimming. Coach just said your gonna do 3,000. Someone else shouted out, yeah it will be 60. So I take off thinking, oh I can do 60 lenths, that shouldn't be too bad. Well it is taking my brain a little while to catch up because I was trying not to lose track of what number I was on. So pretty soon I start closing in on 60 lengths and I am feeling pretty darn good. Now I start to think, well why is everyone else still swimming, maybe I need to do the math on this. So my heart sank when I realized that we had to do 60 laps or 120 lengths! Wow I was only 1/2 way done! My time for 1 mile non-stop (66 lengths) was 40 min, so I was feeling alright. Now keep in mind 6 months ago I was winded after 1 lap!

We also got our race wetsuits today! I had ordered a sleeveless and couldn't wait to get home and check it out. It fit great, was a bit of a pain to get into, but real easy to get out of. It is our Team-In-Training suit and they have been supplied by Fit 2 Race. Very happy with the fit! In the next couple weeks I am sure we will have a training session in them!

Thoughts on progress

Well today was the end to another hectic week. Welcome to the weekend!
So I picked up some books today on eating gluten-free. I am willing to give it a try. Hoping this will help me with my skin, my mood and my energy levels.
So tomorrow we will be having a long swim training session. On Sunday we are supposed to be biking, but I am thinking about entering the Singer Island Sprint Tri. I am leaning towards doing the race, it will be less of a beating than our bike training, LOL.

T-minus 29 days to race day. Guess I should get busy booking our flights! Grant & Mac will be tagging along and we will probably spend a few extra days to check out the sites.

Overall training is going good. When I get frustrated, I just look back to last year when I started on this journey and realize how far I have come. Jan of 2007 I got my first road bike and starting training for a century ride. I remember how unstable I felt on that thing and having cars whiz by my tail.

In Sept of 2007 I started to incorporate running, my least favorite activity in the whole world, right next to listening to country music :) When I started jogging, I could hardly go for a minute and my pace was around a 20 min/mi. I remember my big goal was to be able to jog non-stop to the end of my street! I managed to eek thru the Disney 1/2 Marathon in Jan of 2008 at a average pace around 17:00 min/mi. Here we are in July and I am getting around 14:00 min/mi, unless its been a brick run and then I'm closer to 16:00 min/mi.

As a kid growing up in south Florida, swimming was a natural progression. I was on a swim team when I was little and I am a certified open water diver. I "thought" my swimming fitness was okay until the day I went to the pool to start some swim training in Feb of 2008. I could hardly swim 2 lengths of the pool without being winded! How the heck was I gonna do a 1/4 mi in the ocean. Oh yeah, the current. That's what I kept telling myself. As our swim training progressed, I was able to start builiding my swim stamina and I also learned to swim efficiently. Now I can swim seemingly endless laps at a comfortable pace and with a low heart rate. Gotta keep your head down, roll your body, stretch that stroke & feel the water! I'm an experienced swimmer and it took me a while to absorb this stuff, but its finally sinking in.

So next month I have the Loggerhead Sprint Tri and the Chicago Olympic Tri (my big event ). I am really enjoying this new sport and I am such a gear head, I love my gadgets. To those just starting out, be patient. Build your base, view your race as an experience. Me I just embrace being last in my age group :) I seem to do well on the swim & bike, but my run, well it needs some work.

First Post - my ramblings :)

Okay so I found this bloggin site and here I go.
In 30 days from today I will be racing in my first ever Olympic Distance Triathlon. I am doing the Accenture Chicago Triathlon on Aug 24 with Team In Training. I hav been fairly consistent with my training, with the exception of taking vacation last month and getting the flu :(
We had a mock triathlon last week in which our coach had us swim some unknown distance (1/2 mi?) and then we rode 9 miles and ran 4 miles. Needless to say it was hot, but not too difficult. We are swimming every Saturday for around 60 min and Sundays we bike about 30 miles and then run 4 miles afterwards. Someday I will get back from the bike ride with everyone else and get to run the full 4 miles, but who knows when that will be.
Did I mention that I am one of very, very, very few people on my team that has not done several olympic distance tri's? Yes so us 2 or 3 people (depends on who shows up) always end up lagging the group coming back.
My swimming: I would like to think that my swimming will not be an issue. I feel pretty strong in the water, my pulse stays relatively low and I feel pretty efficient. I would like to swim faster, but with a mile swim before my other 2 events, I am thinking it is better to be a little slower and well rested, than gain a couple minutes and be spent!
My biking: So right now my average bike speed when solo is about 17 mph. With the group I can usually hang around 20 mph, as long as I am drafting. Distance is not a problem, as I have recently done a 75 miler, a 50 miler and we normally do 30 milers every weekend. These are no sweat.
My run: so this is where things go badly for me. Yes being overweight makes me a horrible runner. I consistently am close to last as far as run times go. Now I have been making progress. I am running sub 14 minute miles at the gym now and averaging 16 min miles on our post-cycling training runs. Last year I could only manage about a 17.5 min mile and that was straight out of bed. So progress is happening here, just not as quick as I like. Now I did run for a whopping 1/2 mile straight last night. Yes I know, small steps.
Well guess that is all for now. Stay tuned for more pain tomorrow and this weekend. I am on the fence about doing a sprint tri on Sunday. I really need the time in training with the team, but I could really use the race experience too. Well time and weather will tell :)