Hump Day Randomness

* I left my ART treatment today without a follow-up appointment.  Apparently nothing says “your leg is fine” like running 18 miles without pain.

* The deep cleaning of the house went about as well as expected.  After spending 90 minutes on the master bath, the cleaning ladies called for reinforcements.  I turned around from my computer and suddenly there were more of them at work.  Yes, I’m sorry, yes, it’s dirty, yes, regular maintenance would be better, yes, why don’t you try living with 3 hairy active dogs and training for Ironman, here’s a $50 tip, please come back again, PLEASE!

* I am not getting sick.  I am NOT getting sick.  I am just jetlagged and sleep deprived and tired from my long run.  I AM NOT getting sick.  Not not NOT! NO. SICK. HERE.!!!

* 7.5 weeks until Ironman!  It’s short and long all at the same time.  I am confident there is a lot of training time left to get stronger and yet it seems soon enough that I’m getting excited and thinking of all my wonderful friends and family who are coming and what fun we will have and how I’m going to sleep through the entire fluffy relaxing NON-DEEP TISSUE massage I am scheduling for the day after and wondering if I will last even 1 second on the mechanical bull the night after IM, especially if I drink a celebratory mai tai.  It’ll be here before I know it!

* The first deep tissue massage after IM is going to hurt.  A lot.

* Hockey season starts tomorrow.  Sharks at Avalanche.  I don’t know if we will be able to watch the game though.  If you haven’t heard, DirecTV and Comcast (who owns Versus) are in a little war about showing Versus and the first game of the season is being aired on, you guessed it, Versus.  I need to find a friend with Comcast in a hurry.

* Stanley got a promotion.  He’s moving up from the Advanced agility class to the Competition class, the same level Max has been training at for years.  It’s a good thing, it means Stan is ready for tougher challenges.  But it also means we go back to being the baby dog in the class, biffing up the hard courses while looking like morons, for a while. 

* Getting very sleepy now.  I think it’s time to get back to 9pm bedtimes for a few weeks.

Strong kickoff to the training week

2 hours, 45 minutes. 18.01 miles. Yeah, baby.

I *heart* long runs!

And in MY training world…

I’m wrapping up rest week and ready to kick off another big one.  It’s funny that I feel more tired at the end of rest week than the beginning, but I think that’s actually my legs begging for some hard work.  I’ll get home tomorrow and get right back on the big volume Tuesday!  Spending the weekend talking to Danni about our upcoming Ironman races (she’s got Florida in 6 weeks, I’ve got Arizona in 8 weeks) made me really excited to get there!

Training totals for week 40 (September 21-27):
Swim: ~4870 yards
Bike: 55.5 miles
Run: 8 miles
Total time: 7 hours

Plus 2 hours of yoga

Augusta 70.3 Spectathlete Report Part 2

The day started bright and early when I went to bed around 11pm and discovered I’d messed my back up somewhere along the way in airline travels and hotel beds.  Oh sorry, I mean the day started dark and early when Danni’s alarm went off at 5am.  But really, I spent half the night trying to find positions that would stretch my back out.

Danni went ahead to transition to prepare her gear while I dawdled in the room.  I headed to the swim start around 7am to meet her and our other friends there.

We watched the mens and womens pro waves take off the dock (all other waves would be doing a water start).

Danni was ready to rock and roll!

Wes was prepared and eager to start as well

I was so happy I finally found Sherry right before her wave started!

And then, W30-34 with Danni and Sherry was off!

Wes still had a number of waves to wait through

After taking Danni’s pre-race bag back to the hotel, I dashed to the swim finish to make sure I saw everyone get out.

Sherry was first out with a super fast swim and off onto the bike

Danni was right on her heels, just a minute behind her out of the water.  Great job, ladies!

And not too long after, there was Wes with another swift time, and a wave to acknowledge the ELF’s reminders that I was shouting at him as he rode away

On my walk back to the hotel to shower while everyone was riding, I ran into this little guy for the 2nd time of the morning.  He was too skittish to let me near him but seemed to have his own little setup in an abandoned hotel parking lot.  :(

A typical scene from downtown Augusta (on my 5 block walk back to the hotel from transition).  So many closed-down storefronts and empty space.  Again, :(

After a bit of cleanup and relaxation, it was time to move down to the run course for several hours of chasing my people around.  The first racer I saw go by was Laura Bennett, running down Pip Taylor for the lead.  Laura ended up winning the women’s pro race, and her husband Greg won the men’s race.

She did the entire race in that bathing suit.  She is so much smaller than I expected in person.

Before long, Danni and Sherry were rolling into transition with smoking fast bike times.  They looked great headed out on their run.

Not long after, Wes was in the mix after a fantastic bike ride.

I did my best to entertain them and keep them smiling as I saw them every 2-3 miles.  I ran alongside them, passing on words of encouragement from their coaches and telling them how FREAKING FAST they were!

I was thrilled to be at the finish line and watch Danni absolutely CRUSH her old 1/2 Iron PR.  She stuck with her race from start to finish, hung tough and “kept her shit together.”

And Sherry finished her first 1/2 Iron! So proud of her!

So did her husband – aren’t they a cute 1/2 Iron couple?

Finally it was time for us to cheer Wes on in from a rough run.  From all the Facebook comments going back and forth, I hear it was a PR effort for him as well.  Congrats Wes!!!  He’s happy to be done, I’m sure he is. :)

With that, our adventures were concluded and it was time to schlep Danni to transition to collect her gear and then walk it all back to the hotel.  She cleaned up, packed her stuff and hit the road!

Since I don’t fly out until tomorrow morning, I had to find some dinner before all of “vibrant” downtown Augusta shut down (the race folks had to convince like 3 coffee shops/restaurants to stay open on Sunday to feed all the spectators – when I went to buy lunch, it became clear how overwhelmed they were by the whole event). 

I walked the 5 blocks to Nacho Mama’s – about the only thing left open – and back with my dinner.  It was 5:30 pm and already the race had cleared out of town and it was nearly empty.  Except all the nice gentlemen hanging out in the alley one block from my hotel, who felt the special need to tell me exactly how nice I looked.  Um, awkward?!  Good thing I didn’t race today and could walk very fast.  Given the fear of running out of food that we faced yesterday, I might have gone a little overboard but better safe than sorry, right?

I’m enjoying a quiet evening in front of the TV, keeping my feet up (and compression socks on) and trying to rest my back.   I’ll be at the airport bright and early, hoping Delta will get me home!

Enjoy the rest of your weekends!  Congrats to all of my friends who raced this weekend, including 2 back home who did their first triathlons!

Augusta 70.3 Spectathlete Report Part 1

I rolled into Augusta late Friday night and Danni met me at the airport.  We instantly witnessed a bat signal from our coach in the form of a license plate that read “ELF-193.”  Unfortunately it was difficult to photograph in the dark, from a distance, in a moving vehicle.

This morning, Danni and I walked to transition to go for a swim and check things out.  Augusta is certainly an interesting mix of old and new.  Beautiful old homes that sadly are not well maintained anymore, a surprisingly number of empty downtown storefronts (that left us panicked and starving when we could not find breakfast), and an influx of Ironman athletes whizzing around on tri bikes.

I spotted this establishment next door to the hotel.  Class. Ee.

I must admit, I was envious of this swim venue.  Comfortable water and a STRONG downstream current.  There are going to be some fast swim times tomorrow.

That’s South Carolina on the other side of the river!

Trying our best to pose

Danni in the world’s slowest USAT check-in line

I am sympathetic to the bobbles that happen along the way with a new race.  That said, I’ve never done a 70.3 event with such chaotic and inefficient check-in procedures.  The result was that we – and probably others – spent less $$ than we would have otherwise at the expo because it was so overwhelmingly crowded, and we’d spent so much time on our feet waiting in lines, that we just wanted to get out.

A drive of the bike course was up next and again I’ll say, if not for logistical issues involved in getting my bike here and my focus on my A race in 8 weeks, this would be a great ride to do.  Beautiful scenery, gentle gradual hills, and mostly well-paved roads.

Who in their right mind goes out and rides the entire bike course the day before? We saw a LOT of these folks.

After lunch and a well-deserved rest, it was time to check Danni’s bike into transition!

Eleanor is ready to race tomorrow!

Finally (long day!), we met Wes and DeeDee and Kevin and Cathy for dinner.  Around 2 hours later, we finally got our food.  Again, Ironman appears to be a bit much for Augusta to handle.

With athletes fed, it’s time to bed.  I will see everyone off on the swim tomorrow, do my assigned run, and then cheer them all to the finish!

Morning Brick

Swim

Starting out with the sun barely up

Goggle eyes are hawt

Bike

Loop after loop of the Tri for Fun course

Quarries on my right

Vineyards on my left

Still a great day to be out enjoying the sunshine

Transition in the front seat of my car

Run

Up and down the hills on the dirt trails

80 degrees and not a bit of shade

The arroyo provided some nice scenery though

Done

And not a moment too soon.

Bring on Augusta!!!* I will be the best spectathlete I can be!!!

*P.S.  Dear Delta Airlines, YOU SUCK.  I’ve never flown you before this year.  My first attempt in June, you screwed me over by rebooking me without notifying me and sent me halfway across the country on my way home.  Today, I went to check in for tomorrow’s flight and discovered that once again, I’ve been rebooked.  Instead of leaving at 6am and arriving in Augusta at 4:30pm, with one connection, I will be leaving at 10am and arriving at 9pm with two connections and only 30-minute layovers to make it to my next flights.  This leaves my hotel roommate, who IS racing, without a room until I arrive.  Suffice it to say, I will never fly your airline again.