Wooo, havent posted in over a month!

Time to get back into it.

I didn't go to Arizona to do the Ironman. My legs, shins, and ankles were giving me too many problems. So now I have the Oceanside 70.3 to train for.

I just updated my year-to-date miles, see spreadsheet on the left. I guess they look impressive to anyone who hasn't yet trained for an Ironman. Unfortunately, for IM training I came up woefully short. It looks like November turned out to be a "rest" month ( I was actually tapering, with the intention of going to Arizona).

Today starts the USAT triathlon competition, where teams try to rack up the most swim, bike and run miles in a respective month. This month is swimming, so I need to get to the pool!

My fastest "marathon" ever

Last week I ran/jogged/walked 26.3 miles over the course of 4 days, which qualifies as my fastest marathon ever.
Tuesday: 10 miles
Wednesday: 6.8 miles
Friday: 9.5 miles
Here it is 3 days later, and my feet still hurt.

A word or two on walking...

http://chuckiev.blogspot.com/2008/07/walk-this-way.html

There's some good information there. Walking can be tough, I walked 11 miles Tuesday (there were a few spurts of running mixed in), then my 6 mile run the following day was pretty damn painful.

The MS 150 bike ride is this weekend, so I have to be up around 3am tomorrow. I'm still debating whether to do the 150 miles (on practically no training), or wimp out and do the 100 miles (on practically no training).

A quick trip to Austin...

(Texas) to watch Brian, Katie, Tim, Ryan and Dana (see blog links at right) finish the Longhorn 70.3 last weekend. It was fun being the team sherpa and cheering everyone on instead of racing. They all finished, and quicker than I would have. Congrats to all!

Refocus on my training...and what cartoon character are you related to?

With all my running injuries (feels like shin splints and plantar fascitis (sp?) and IT band issues all rolled up into one) I have come to terms with what my Ironman run is going to look like...a 26.2 mile walk, with some jogging interspersed here and there. So I am going to start walking as much as possible to get used to the feel and to get extra miles in. Today I had a good excuse, my roommate's car wouldn't start so I let her use my truck and I walked to work, about 3.5 miles. Tonight I'll take the long way home and try to make it 9 or 10 miles for the day.

I feel that if I traced my lineage back I would find Popeye somewhere in my bloodline. Every time I start ramping up my swim volume my forearms become more noticably massive. Not something cool like my shoulders or biceps, but my forearms. Are women attracted to big forearms? Now all I need is an anchor tattoo and a corncob pipe...

My body is falling apart

I guess I've been lucky for the past 18 months or so...I've had the ability to work out hard and not really feel the effects the next day, which would allow me to train again. Lately it seems like I feel the effects of a workout days later...and not necessarily a hard workout. I guess old age is catching up to me. Anyway all this stems from 3 runs I had last week:

Wednesday: ran 5 miles at a fairly fast pace (for me)

Thursday: was only able to do 4 miles at track (including warm-up and cool-down), ankles and shins were bothering me

Saturday: I went for a "run"at Kit Carson Park, which degenerated into something that resembled a 1-minute run/3 minute walk. I had nothing in me, plus my legs were still smarting from Wednesday.

So I need to change up my Ironman plan. I need to start walking A LOT.

Speaking of old age, Jen Ferkins threw me a birthday party and it was awesome! Ate some tacos, ate some cake, watched an episode of the Office, tequila, more food, and Brian in a gold bikini...all in all it was a good time.

Below is last week's effort. It was a recovery week and fairly light.

Slowly improving...but is it enough?

Biked for an hour today. I ended up doing 67% of my assigned workouts this week. I guess in the grand scheme of things I might not be able to finish this Ironman in November but I at least got in 10 solid hours of training, which in theory is keeping me healthier.

Back to feeling lousy

After giving my friend Amanda a swim lesson in the ocean, I went off for a bike and run. My training schedule said a 6-hour bike, but my goal was to just get out and do as much as possible. I ended up riding 2 hours and running 25 minutes. I think a lot of this was due to boredom, I need to start riding with other people so I have someone to talk to.
Also the good feeling I had last night didn't last, I am back to feeling lousy.

Felt good...for 1 day out of the last 7 months

Tonight I forced myself to go to LA Fitness and get in an hour spin class. Once that was out of the way, I decided that since I was already there and since I was way behind on my swim volume for the week that I would get in a quick 1000y. I finished all that and I when I got out of the pool, I realized that I actually felt GOOD. No pressure in the back of the head, no sleepyness, and I actually felt like I had some energy. I couldn't remember the last time I felt this close to normalcy. If I could feel like this all the time I'd have no problem dropping weight and being able to finish the Ironman in November.

Anatomy of a missed workout

The good news: I ran my 2 hours on Wednesday without making my blisters worse. I just took it slow and threw in a bunch of walking. 9.25 miles total. I would have liked to go further but I'm not going to beat myself up for that.

The bad news: I missed my Thursday night track workout. I see a definite pattern with these missed workouts. Here's how it went down yesterday:
8am-noon: looking forward to the workout
Noon: start getting a headache and feeling tired
Noon-4pm: headache gets worse. I feel like someone is stabbing me in the back of the eyes.
4pm: go home and lie down, fall asleep until 7:30
7:30-wake up still feeling headachy and groggy. I try to gather the energy to go swim but it never happens.
So then since I took a nap I'm unable to fall asleep until about 4am. Ugh.

Feet don't fail me now

Yesterday's (Tuesday's) effort started off with a spin class at lunch. I was all jazzed about meeting Breakaway at Fiesta Island after work for a speed brick, but as 5:00 approached it was obvious I wasn't going to get out of work on time-I generally need to leave a little before 5 to get to Fiesta or La Jolla by 5:45. So I left work around 5:40 (visualize shoulders slumped, head down, with sad Charlie Brown music playing in the background). As I stepped outside the weather was so beautiful that I just pulled my bike out of the back of the truck and hopped on...I didn't worry about fuel, water, sunscreen, or the fact that my clothes reeked from me accidentally leaving them in the gym bag overnight with my wet swim towel and suit. So with my keys and gus jammed into my aero bottle (no bento box or pockets) I did a quick ride the the end of the 56 bike path and back, about 15 miles.
Once back I decided to complete the brick and go for a run, but not too far because I was wearing a brand new pair of Sauconys that hadn't been broken in. I ran for 20 minutes and felt fine, but last night I realized there were 2 spots on my right foot where the shoes rubbed the skin right off. Ugh.
Tonight's effort is a 2-hour run. I am putting band aids all over my feet and hopefully I'll be able to put in a good effort without injuring myself.
FYI yesterday's effort = 1:55 on the bike, 0:20 on the run

Disclaimer about last weeks effort...

One reason why my training volume was down-I had an epic dentist appointment Tuesday; 1/2 of a deep cleaning and a filling replaced. 2 hours of skull-vibrating goodness. So I sure wasn't in the mood to work out that day! I think Wednesday's effort was poor too.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Am I back? Nah

I am slowly getting in more and more training. I wouldn't say I am back 100%, as last week's training log had 18.3 hours to do and I only finished 10.25...or about 55%...but each week I am putting in a little more than the prior week. Any motivational/inspirational words would help! Here is last week's volume...

Last night I was supposed to swim 3600 yards. I made it to 1500 (0:40) before I had to stop...my stomach was on fire (forgot to take a Zantac), and my sinuses were clogged for several hours afterwards. Maybe I need to invest in some nose plugs and see if that stops the problem.

America's Finest City half-marathon 8/17/08

This is just a quick update as I am trying to get caught up with my blogging. I thought this race was great! This was my first official "half-marathon"...all the other times I've run 13.1 miles there have been a bunch of swimming and biking right beforehand. I ended up running it in 2:40, which is a PR for me but I'm surprised that it took me that long when I ran the distance at the Wildflower Long course in 2:52 (a tough run course with a tough bike beforehand). Oh well a PR is a PR. I saw lots of friends and acquaintances out there and overall had a blast.
Also, lesson learned: 1/2 marathon aid stations aren't stocked with food like the 1/2 ironman aid stations are. I had about 300 calories with me, luckily I saw Dana and Penny around mile 9 and they graciously shared some food and salt tabs with me.
I definitely want to do this one again next year.

Did I forget to post the Vineman race report?

Yep...and everything else that happened in the past 6 weeks.

Actually it wasn't forgetfulness, it was more like the malaise that has engulfed my body ever since February. My goal has been to train and blog, but I can barely motivate myself to train, and the effort is usually so mediocre that I don't bother blogging the attempt. But more on that later.

Here are Katie and Dana (circled). I had planned on doing something with this picture but changed my mind...and it turns out that once I upload something into Blogger I don't know how to remove it. So feel free to ignore this picture (and this sentence explaining what happened)

I am really really surprised that I finished Vineman. I wasn't in the mood mentally or physically to do this thing, even though I had rented a cabin in Guerneville and was surrounded by friends both old and new. Brian and Katie even came up to cheer us all on, which I thought was really great.

Since the race happened over 7 weeks ago I forget most of the specifics, but here goes:

Vineman 2008, aka The 70.3 That Didn't Hurt
THE LEAD-UP
Woke up to the usual Guerneville morning fog. It was pretty cold, but I kept telling everyone to prepare for 100 degree temperatures later in the day (never happened). I was in the 2nd to last wave (start at 8:22am), so I took my time getting down to the transition area. I could tell Sandra and Dana (left) were excited to participate in their first half-ironman!


THE SWIM
At 8:22 the gun goes off and I'm swimming the 1.2 miles. I really haven't been training hard at swimming, but instead focusing on form and energy conservation. I also focused on having an "honest" swim, since at some places the river is literally 12-16 inches deep and the temptation is there to just stand up and walk. But I kept honest, even at the turnaround point where my hands were scraping the bottom on every stroke and every single person around me was walking.

I swim in and my time turns out to be 0:39:30; I was able to have a smooth easy swim AND break one of my old goals of 40 minutes. So I got that goin for me.

Swim rank = 1191 out of 1825. This can almost be considered "back of the middle of the pack", which makes me so happy I can barely stand it.

T1
I always feel lame for including my transition times, because 1) I don't feel they reflect fitness level (or much else), 2) they are easy to manipulate if the athlete feels so inclined, and 3) my transition times usually suck. As usual I took it fairly slow to give my stomach time to adjust from the horizontal to the vertical, and my time turned out to be 0:5:23, which is pretty poor by coach Gurujan's standards. However my T1 ranking for the day was 1328th out of 1825. What the hell were those other 500 people doing?


THE BIKE
So as usual, about 5 miles into the bike I start feeling horrible and feel like quitting. I don't know why this happens, but I suspect I get water in my sinuses from the swim and it induces some sort of pressure-migraine effect on my head and brain. So the next 10 miles or so consist of me searching for some reason to keep on going and finishing this damn thing. The reasons that ultimately kept me going were:

• I've never DNF'ed a half-ironman before. If I finished this one, I would have completed 4 halves in under a year. If I didn't finish, I would have to say I DNF'ed a half and I didn't want that


• There is the possibility that I could cheer someone on and motivate them to finish when they otherwise wouldn't
  

So I decided to just go as slowly as I needed to on the bike, and enjoy the day and the scenery. My ultimate goal was to finish this race unhurt, and have the ability to continue training the next day or the day after.

Around mile 25 I caught up with Dana, who was changing her 2nd flat of the day. She was pretty discouraged so I stopped and chatted with her for awhile and tried to cheer her up (which was tough because my attitude was probably worse).

FYI here is an excerpt from Dana's blog "I'm feeling like I'm WAY behind on time and going to have to race the clock without much luck of making the cut. ok - it's going to be ok. and then i see him. paul has caught me and i know that i'm in trouble of not making it"...I'm hoping she was referring to the fact that I started 2 waves behind her, and not to my slowness :P

Anyways, to make a long story short (too late Paul) I finished the bike in 3:56:53, about 30 minutes slower then last year but given my current state I was just happy to finish.

Bike rank: 1750 out of 1825 (ugh)

T2

Again, same as T1...I take my time to take off my bike gear and change into my run stuff, T2 time = 0:4:29. Ranking = 1061 out of 1825. Looking back I could have easily shaved off a minute and been in the top 700. Maybe that should be my new goal, at least I can be in the triple-digits for SOMETHING.

THE RUN
I brought my road bike instead of my triathlon bike so my quads were cramping up almost immediately. Last time, Coach Felipe! No more road bikes in triathlon, I swear!

So as I said before it was a lot cooler this year. It was maybe 80 degrees on the run, whereas last year it was 100+. nothing interesting to report, just a 13.1 mile out and back in 3:04:52 (about 30 minutes faster than last year). I get near the finish line and see Katie jumping up and down and screaming her head off...she was either 1) excited to see me, or 2) was waiting so long for me to finish that she really had to go to the bathroom. She ran the last mile with me which was super-cool because I was ready for the race to be over.

run rank: 1729 out of 1825.

Final ranking = 1695 out of 1825, time = 7:51:08 or about 4 minutes faster than last year. I stated above that I wanted to finish the race unhurt. It turns out that after a cold bath (no ice available) that I only had mild soreness the next day and wasn't forced to take time off to recover. So that plus my swim PR made a pretty decent day.

Thanks for reading, and I banged this out without proofing so sorry for any spelling errors!

Vineman 70.3 tomorrow!

The weather is cooling in Windsor...good news! There's a good chance it won't be 100 degrees on the run this year.
I was originally hoping to break 7 hours this year, but with all my ankle injuries and feeling like garbage I'm just going to go out and enjoy the day and do my best.
Today Me, Dana, Jason, Sandra, and Tina went swimming (about 500 yards or so). We picked up our race packets and set up our bike-to-run transition items (T2 is 15 miles away from T1). Tonight we had an awesome pasta dinner made by Tina, and it's off to bed early tonight. Wish me luck!

Vineman lead-up

It's been awhile since I've blogged. I still haven't been feeling right and have only been training about 5 hours/week since Wildflower.
I am currently in Guerneville for the Vineman 70.3 triathlon on Sunday. The river temperature is warm, about 76 degrees. It is cool in the shade but hot if you are in the sun! I just ran 2 miles and it feels a lot hotter than the 74 degrees stated on Weather.com.

Swim cramp

Yesterday I tried to get in a swim before track practice. At around 2150 yards I got a cramp in my right lower calf. After massaging it for awhile I decided I should skip the track workout. Since I dropped out of the Deathride I've been focusing on swimming and running which is probably the reason for the cramp. I need to stretch out more.

Heavy workout day

I got to the pool this morning shortly before a water aerobics class started so I was only able to get in 1100 yards. Also today was my long slow run day so I split it up between lunch and nighttime, ran 10.1 miles total.

Breakaway!

I actually tore myself away from work and joined Breakaway for spin class followed by a 30-minute run. It was nice to be able to get back and see everybody. Marty was there with his new bike that he crashed already. If he doesn't kill himself he'll do great at Kona.

Totals for the week ending 6/22/08

Since I dropped out of the Deathride I've given myself a short vacation from the bike. My swim and run totals are getting back up (hopefully I'm not increasing too fast)

swim-5000 yards
bike-17 miles
run-21.6 miles

Heh, I ran further than I biked.

Mid-week training check-in

Monday-off

Tuesday-45-minute spin class

Wednesday-swam 1500 yards. This was my first swim in 3 weeks, so I focused solely on form and didn't care about the clock. I felt I was swimming extremely slow, but I ended up finishing the 1500 in about 35 minutes, which is good for me. Immediately after I ran my usual Wednesday night run with Steve. It is starting to get hotter so I had to take several walk breaks. My run has really suffered in the month since Wildflower, I hope I can get it back by Vineman.

Thursday-55-minute spin class. About halfway through I got a cramp in my left calf, probably from poor running form the night before. I did a right-leg ILT for 5-minutes while the cramp went away. At night I walked 2 miles to stretch my legs out a bit.

Solanamar-ugh and no more Deathride

Today the ACE team rode from the Solana Beach train station up Palomar Mountain. 50 miles, 6 hours. 9,500 feet of climbing per my Garmin but it looks more like 7k to me. Click the picture on the right for a larger view.

When I reached the top I was so loopy I didn't want to risk crashing on the way down so I got SAGged in. I had a massive headache for about an hour, and once that cleared up I realized my knees were killing me too. I decided that I've missed too much training to finish this Deathride thing so I need to drop out. Hopefully I can salvage enough training to have a good showing at Vineman in 6 weeks. My totals for the week look pretty dismal. I'm hoping I can get away from work a bit next week and step it up.

Swim-0 yards (I'll need to do more)

Bike-85 miles

Run-9 miles

Taking it easy...

workout today consisted of 4 miles of walking. I'm trying to up my mileage without straining my ankles and knees too much

Work work work

Back to the grind, and trying to squeeze in workouts here and there. It's tough when you leave work physically and emotionally drained. So far:
Tuesday: ran 2.7 miles
Wednesday: spin 0:55 run 0:15
Thursday spin 0:50 run 0:12
According to my Deathride training schedule I need to be cycling about 200 miles a week at this point. I need to step it up.

Ice bath

I took an ice bath immediately after the Tahoe Century and I felt great the next day. Very little pain and soreness. and this is without doing any stretching after the ride, which is usually a big mistake.
Here's how I did it:

• Fill tub with cold water
• Get in tub and sit there for 5 minutes
• Dump 10 pounds of ice into the tub
• Sit there for 5 minutes
• Stand up and crank up a nice hot shower

Ride day! America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride

What an awesome ride! The water was very clear and the weather was great! It was a bit chilly in the morning (mid 40's) but we were all bundled up.

The route is a complete circle around the lake, with an out-and-back to Truckee to make the ride an even 100 miles. We stopped many times to take pictures and cheer on other teammates so this turned out to be my longest century ride (10:50). All in all, I would highly recommend doing this ride at least once in your life.

Team in Training ended up raising $8.5 million for this ride. The San Diego Rock n' Roll Marathon was the same day and $12.5 million was raised there...so $21 million was raised towards cancer research that day.

Day before race day

Today we had a 22-mile tune-up ride. along the way we stopped to take team pictures. At one point we were very close to one of the mountain passes that we will be riding on the Deathride, so the ACE team rode a few extra miles along the route.
I recall driving up to Tahoe along the 395 highway and looking off to the left at a steep mountain and thinking "Gee, I'm glad I don't have to drive in that direction." Since then I have examined the route map for the Deathride, and determined that mountain is one of the passes I have to RIDE MY BIKE OVER.

In Tahoe for America's Most Beautiful Bike Ride

The Team in Training group arrived a couple days early so we could acclimate to the higher altitude (about 7000 feet above sea level). What a difference! I ran from my hotel to the team's hotel (about 0.75 mile) and was out of breath before I got there.

This past week's workouts....

Friday 5/23-swam 1100y, using the new techniques Coach Luke taught me. It was tough to pace myself, and I had to rest every 150y or so, but overall I was still faster than normal even with the stopping. I really want to hit the pool and work on this more but my job is still killing me so it's hard to work swims into my day.

Saturday 5/24-Final prep day with Team in Training for the Tahoe century ride. Most of the ACE team rode with the C team, 42 miles. It was nice to ride fast and flat instead of grinding up a mountain at 5mph.

Sunday/Monday 5/25-5/26-Still feeling pretty blah, just did a bunch of walking to burn calories and keep my leg muscles loose.

Wednesday 5/28-I was supposed to run 90 minutes, but only ran 60. It was tough at first, with my knees hurting. Oh well, it was better than nothing. I need to keep my run going, I want to have a good showing at Vineman in July.
Also during my post-run stretch I noticed my knee still hurts from where I fell on my bike at Wildflower. More like a twinge, but it is still noticable.

Thursday morning 5/29-I actually felt good this morning when I woke up. First time in months, it feels like. Hopefully I am almost over whatever this "thing" is that's been making me feel like garbage (since February) and I can get back on my training plan.

Thursday workout

I knew I'd have to work late today and miss tonight's track workout, so I got in a spin and run on the treadmill during lunch (0:50/0:12). The run felt a lot better than yesterday's, my legs and ankles weren't so tight. I need to hit more spin classes if I'm going to complete the Deathride in July.

Today's workout

Ran for 60 minutes with Steve. Not one of our best runs, but we got out there for an hour and got almost 5 miles in. I need to keep stretching and start getting in long low-intensity run/walks.

I stole the Subway Employee's Manual

Here is an excerpt:
It is our goal to screw up every sandwich we make. Long-time customers realize this and will watch you like a hawk to make sure you don't throw on anything they don't want. Rise up to this challenge! The best time to sneak on unwanted food is when they turn to the register to pay.

• If it appears the customer is in a hurry, throw on a handful of olives. It takes forever to pick them off and the customer will just accept the sandwich as-is, rather than wait.
• If there is a long line, try oil & vinegar. It is impossible to pick off, the sandwich is ruined, and the customer won't want to hold up the line to have a new sandwich made. Warning: this is an advanced maneuver! You need to pick up the oil & vinegar bottles, invert them and give the sandwich a good soaking in about 0.5 seconds before the customer has a chance to say anything.

Today's workout

Spin class at lunch-50 minutes
followed by a 20-minute run on the treadmill.

Team in Training ACE ride

I have officially renamed the TNT ACE Team
Old name: ACE (altitude, climbing, endurance)
New name: ACHE (altitude, climbing, heat, endurance)

I have some other acronyms in mind, but since this is a family blog I will not post them here.

So with a heat wave descending on San Diego, coach Phil changed our scheduled 108-mile route to a 63-mile (Kit Carson to Palomar and back, 9900' of climb). I had new cycling shoes and a new rear cassette (changed from a 27 to a 32 to help with the hills).
Below are some of the fun fun things that happened on that ride:

• The 90 degree heat. I think it was cooler at the top of the mountain, but still...it was hot! With the heat my heart rate was elevated, so it was hard to tell how much the rear cassette helped, but I'm sure it did.
• At Mile 17 my seat post bolt snapped and pieces went flying; luckily I was on a flat (near Rincon) and was able to keep myself from falling, but as I'm standing on the pedals going 20mph I realize I've never clipped out and stopped while standing. Luckily I was able to do so without falling. So this is the second time in 2 years I've had a bolt snap on me, I'm thinking I need to center myself in the seat better (or lose some weight)
• Mentor Lisa lost her keys SOMEWHERE on the mountain...SAG drove her and Joanie back to the top of the mountain so they could ride back down looking for them (imagine riding down Solidad, and braking constantly to keep your speed at 5mph for 12 miles down that thing!)
• Joanie discovered (the hard way) that she can no longer drink a V-8 on long hot rides without getting sick
• Kudos to coach Phil for keeping a positive attitude, even when his team was strewn all over Palomar Mountain.

Skipped track tonight...

I was working late and couldn't afford the time to make the 3-hour round trip to La Jolla High. Luckily Jen Ferkins called me up and wanted to run, so we met at my house. Ended up doing an easy 4 miles (Cliffy, the big black dog, joined us for part of the run so that part was mostly walking while he sniffed all the new exciting things along the way...)
So 4 miles is better than nothing, I'm glad I did SOMETHING instead of just blowing off the whole workout

Lousy run

I was supposed to run 90 minutes tonight, but I stayed late at work and decided I could get the run done quicker if I just jumped on the treadmill. I forgot how much I hate running on the treadmill, and I only lasted 21 minutes. I need to break this funk that I am in.

Had a swim lesson this morning...

with coach Luke. I took away several good things to work on, which should make me significantly faster without a wetsuit and slightly faster with a wetsuit. Now I just need a pool, which will be tough with a heat wave coming to San Diego...the denizens of Poway will be filliing the pool at LA Fitness en masse with water walkers and people just wanting to splash around.

Training for Morons in 3 easy steps

1. Pay good money for a coach
2. See what you are supposed to do for a workout for the day
3. Do something completely different

My recommended 3-hour post-Wildflower recovery ride turned into a 9-hour tour of the hills of Poway. 6500'-8500' of climbing (depending on whose Garmin you believe), 86 miles. Lots of pain. I am swapping out my 27 rear cassette for a 32 for the duration of Deathride training, and the Deathride. Oh yea and I might lose some weight too.
Full Garmin Data http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/5633843

Wildflower Long Course Race Report

WILDFLOWER RACE REPORT
I had a blast as usual. I highly recommend this triathlon for anyone who hasn’t done it before. It takes place in Lake San Antonio (freshwater swim!) near Paso Robles. Lots of camping, beer, and good friends.

The days leading up to the race were normal, with me trying to set a record for most weight gained in a week. What WASN’T normal was getting run off the road while on my bike by some pinhead in a car. I went head-first over the handlebars, which makes 3 times for me. I messed up my knee but I just rubbed some dirt in it and kept going.

Oh yea, also Brian tried to run a disabled person off the road. There was consequently some damage to our trusty RV.

This year I was doing the Wildflower “Long Course”, which I think is about a mile less than a half-ironman. It is supposed to be a very tough course, with a hill at mile 40 of the bike that is known as “Nasty Grade”. I only assumed that it was named that due to the toughness of the hill and not some sort of cleanliness factor.

THE SWIM:1.2 miles
Since I swam 1:27 at Arizona Ironman, my goal was to break 40 minutes on this swim. I put on my manly neon-pink swim cap, joined the rest of my wave and awaited my 8:55am start time.
After a short warm-up swim, the horn sounds and off we go. The swim was horrible. Usually I have about 3 minutes of people fighting me, then it thins out a bit and I can swim ahead unmolested. Not this time. I was fighting people the entire swim, and it was difficult to get into a good solid stroke. I was punched, kicked, elbowed in the eye, you name it.
I did get a good laugh halfway through the swim: At one point when I took a breath on my left side, I noticed someone towards my left was angled towards me and approaching fairly fast. 3 strokes later, as I was breathing off my right side, I noticed someone towards my right was angled towards me and approaching fast. Sensing danger, I immediately stopped and those 2 guys bonked heads right in front of me. It was just like in the cartoons, only there was no coconut-like sound when their heads bonked.
I completed the rest of the swim and climbed out of the water and ran up the boat ramp to the transition area. My swim time was 0:40:43; I missed my goal by 43 seconds but it was a PR (personal record); my prior best time for this distance was 0:45:00 so I best my prior best by over 4 minutes.

T1
I wasn’t really looking forward to the bike ride, so I took it slow in T1. As you can see from the picture, I slapped on some sunscreen without worrying about rubbing it in too much. My T1 time ended up being 5:17, which actually didn’t turn out to be too bad vs. the rest of the field.

THE BIKE:55-ish Miles
During the bike, I was suffering most of the time, as usual. I suspect that my triathlon bike isn’t fit to me properly which makes me lose power. Also, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I had finished the bike at Vineman (hilly course, 2600’ of climb) in 3:26 and SOMA (flat course) in 3:10 but this course had 1500 feet of climbing more than Vineman (see profile elevation map). I decided to just take it slow and save all my energy for the dreaded “Nasty Grade”.
That first hill at Mile 1 was tough, since we had just came out of the swim and had cold legs and high heart rates. After that there was a bunch of rolling hills. I was taking it nice and easy, which is psychologically tough because people were passing me left and right. Around Mile 10 my friend Homa (who is on the Team in Training ACE team with me) passed me by and we rode together for awhile. He told me to just take it easy and have a good time and don’t worry about the clock (translation: stop being such a whiny bitch and just suck it up). I took his advice to heart and chatted with people as they passed me by.
I noticed that I myself didn’t pass a single person until Mile 15…next person I passed was at Mile 28. So much for the bike being my strongest discipline…
Around Mile 30 we took a right turn and right into a ~10mph headwind, which really wasn’t too bad. Finally at Mile 40 I reached the bottom of “Nasty Grade”. I had been drinking plenty of water on the bike, to make sure I didn’t have a DNF repeat of Ironman so I was feeling pretty good; unfortunately this meant I really had to use “the facilities”. There was an aid station at the bottom of the hill so I used the restroom, drank some water, poured water on myself to cool off, ate a GU and some salt tabs, then took off up the hill.
I guess it was good that I stopped because I flew up that hill without any problems. It was a piece of cake! The hill wasn’t nearly as steep or as long as I expected, and I still had a full tank of gas, so I flew through the last 16 miles and finished in 3:55:30. Slower than I wanted to go, but I was happy to have finished a bike course that other people have been telling me is very tough.

T2
As soon as I got off the bike, I felt my knee twinge where I had fallen. I chose to ignore it, threw on my running shoes and ran out of the transition area. T2 time = 0:03:59, nothing to write home about but it ended up being my best ranking of the day (see rankings below).

THE RUN-13 miles
Readers of my blog know 3 things about me: 1) I am a horrible runner, 2) I go too hard on the bike, leaving nothing for the run, and 3) I don’t drink enough on the bike which makes me cramp up on the run. So 1+2+3 means a lousy run time, and this course is very hilly (see elevation profile).
However, I have been working very hard on my running (kudos to coach Felipe of Breakaway Training, and my running partner Steve), I took it easy on the bike and I was careful to get enough hydration and fuel, so I was primed for this run. Plus it was a cool day.

Like I said, my knee was bothering me in T2, but the pain must have subsided quickly because I forgot about it for awhile (about mile 10 I realized “oh yea, my knee is supposed to be hurting”).
Other than that initial pain, everything went right on the run. Each aid station I took a cup of water (poured on my head), then drank 6oz water and 6oz Gatorade. At mile 5 I started eating caffeinated GUs. I walked up all hills. Some of the downhills were painful on my knee, and I was afraid it would give out and I would go tumbling down the hill so I had to take it a bit slower down the hills. But I was able to maintain solid 11-12 min/mile pace most of the flats, while walking up hills and walking through aid stations.
Total run time = 2:51:57. Another PR! I blew away my prior best run time in a half-ironman (3:26:31) by over 34 minutes!
Total race time = 7:37:29, which I am pleased with. I took an extremely tough course and almost completed it faster than I completed SOMA last October. I’m hoping to break 7 hours at Vineman this July (unless it is over 100 degrees again).

THE AFTERMATH

6 days later I am still a bit sore, but my knee is better and I got a professional bike fitting. Looking forward to next year!!

Rankings
Swim 0:40:43 1263 out of 1743
T1 0:05:17 1236 out of 1743
Bike 3:55:30 1525 out of 1743
T2 0:03:59 1155 out of 1743
Run 2:51:57 1455 out of 1743

Things to note:
This was my first tri where I did it like it is SUPPOSED to be done, i.e. the bike split is longer than the run
I beat almost 300 people on the run, as opposed to Vineman, where I think I beat 7

On work, weight loss and inspiring people

So I skipped track workout yesterday because I'm still trying to catch up a bit at work. Blech. I'm pretty ok with it though because I'm still sore from last Saturday (yes I owe you a race report for that).

Speaking of last week, I've lost 7.0 pounds since Tuesday morning (3 days), my body is releasing all the water and salt that it's been holding onto from the race. Hope more comes off, I've really packed on some weight since I left for Ironman.

Below is an excerpt from my buddy Bryan Jacobs, who is another person I suckered...err encouraged to complete a long distance event. He is training for a marathon in Alaska June 21st through Team in Training...
I have to say - this has been an extremely rewarding experience. I have been fortunate to do this with my girlfriend, and last night we were doing a CASUAL 7 mile run both reflecting on the first 2 miles we ran less than 4 months ago. We were dying, we were in pain, I couldn't even run the whole thing. Now, I'm casually doing 7 miles, and this weekend will be AGAIN, the longest I've ever ran. It's an exhilarating feeling, and wouldn't have been pursued without your newsletter updates.
Letters like that always give me a lift...it makes me realize my actions have farther-reaching consequences then I can sometimes see.

On never giving up....

Came across on Slowtwitch.com and thought it needed to be thrown out there.

FYI, I finished the Wildflower Long Course last Saturday. Total time ~7:38. I PR'ed the run by 34 minutes and missed PR'ing the course by 11 minutes. Not too bad considering the difficulty of the course. Race report coming soon!

Ewww...

So I uploaded my pics from San Francisco, and had forgotten that I took a picture of a menu while dining at Francisco's on the Wharf.

I don't consider myself to be racist (or am I a self-hating Italian???) but...who in the hell would eat this? Does this look good to anyone? Does anyone out there tend to be eating a bowl of ice cream, decide it's missing something, get up and get out the old salt shaker and bottle of oil???

Fiesta workout

Tonight Breakaway was at Fiesta Island. Since I am racing Saturday it was a light workout; 2 loops on bike + 10 min run + 2 loops on bike + 10 minute run. About 1:20 total. It felt good to get on the bike again.

Still slacking

Spent part of the week in San Francisco and part of the week putting in extra hours at work so I could go to San Francisco. Did the Alcatraz tour and walked across the Golden Gate Bridge so needless to say I did a LOT of walking, but other than that I only worked out 1/2 hour last week! Hopefully this will work as an extreme taper and I will kick butt at the Wildflower long course next Saturday.
I really need to start doing what Felipe and Luke tell me to do...

Slacking

Decided to take the day off today, to recover from my ironman attempt and also recover from yesterday's ride.
Of course my "day off" consisted of laundry, bills, cleaning up the house, etc etc. Gonna try to hit the pool tomorrow.

Ouch

Rode with the Team in Training ACE group today. We went from Kit Carson Park in Escondido to the Palomar Observatory. Over 10k feet of climb, assuming my Garmin is accurate. It was tough!!

Here's the Garmin data http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/5440311

IMAZ Race Report-April 2008-Did Not Finish

Well, as most of you know by now, I did NOT complete my first Ironman on 4/13/08. There was a nice little heat wave that passed through Tempe that day. I watched the weather reports as the predicted weather shot up from 78 on April 5th to 92 on April 13th. Overall the heat and the wind proved to be too much for me.

RACE MORNING
I think I was able to squeak out a good solid 90 minutes of sleep the night before the race (I really need to learn how to get more sleep the night before a race). I started off race morning with a nice 1000+ calorie breakfast at the hotel at 4:30am. Then it was off to the race start; I was staying at the Courtyard Marriott which is only ½ mile from the starting line, which was nice. After getting body marked and chatting with some friends (Scott, Marty, and Colleen), it was time to jump in the water. For those of you who need a refresher on how tasty that Tempe Town Lake water is, see the picture below. Notice you can barely see the hands of the swimmers, even if they are just below the surface of the water.

THE SWIM
At 6:45am the cannon went off to signal the pro’s swim start, and the rest of us paddled to the start line. People nervously joked about various things but I felt pretty calm. At 7:00 the cannon fired and we were off! I started slow and tried to glide through the water to maintain efficiency. There were a few times that I got kicked or punched but nothing too serious. This was my first open-water swim since SOMA (last October) and I kept drifting off to the right, even though I’ve learned to breathe bilaterally. I guess that’s something else to work on.

I swam for about a mile before I stopped to check my bearings and see what time it was. About 40 minutes had elapsed, so I knew I could slow down a bit (my best estimate was that I could break 1:30 if everything went right). I completed my zig-zag swim and came out of the water in 1:27:06, much better than I had hoped.

TRANSITION 1
At this event, instead of having all our bike and run stuff set up next to our bikes, we had to run to an area to grab bags that contained our bike equipment, run into a tent, change, and then run to our bikes. I was taking my time and it shows on my T1 time: 11:40! I guess I was a bit more leisurely than I thought.

THE BIKE
So I hop on my trusty bike and the wind is so bad (or I am so drained of energy) that I immediately think I have a flat tire. I checked a couple times, and even asked a few people that passed me if my back tire was flat. So I’m riding into this insane 25-30mpg headwind and it SUCKS! At one point this 5’ by 5’ piece of fiberglass or particle board comes flying across the road and hits the girl in front of me; I had to swerve to avoid getting hit too. How she stayed upright is beyond me.
By mile 5 I am realizing I’m in trouble. I check my heart rate, realize that it’s a bit high and slow down a bit. I keep waiting for my second wind, but it never comes. After about 19 miles I reach the turnaround point-yee haw! With the wind at my back I can relax a little bit and pick up my speed. My heart rate comes down significantly (see chart) but by the end of the first loop I am exhausted.

Happy Paul-------------------------->

Time to finish the loop = 2:31. Even if I maintained my “slowed” pace for the next 3 loops, which I didn’t think I could, the bike portion would have taken me over 7.5 hours which is significantly slower than I am able to do.
(note: the wind was so bad that it took me 101 minutes to go out the 19 miles, but only 50 minutes to get back)
So I start the second loop, and by the time I reach the mile 50 aid station I need to stop and rest for a bit. I drank, ate, took salt tabs and poured water on myself to try to cool down. Nothing worked, I had no energy. I was torn between wanting to get a ride back to the transition area in the SAG vehicle and being a wimp for not even finishing 2 loops. So after sitting at the aid station for about 30 minutes I decided I would finish the 2nd loop and reassess the situation then.
As I pedaled on, I looked at the blank vacant stares of the other cyclists sitting at the other aid stations or who pulled over to the side of the road. This was a BAD day!!
So I finish the 2nd loop and I feel like all the energy has been sucked out of my body. My legs and stomach felt fine, but I felt like I was going to pass out. I ride to the finish line and drop out of the race.

<-------------------------Sad Paul

So how bad was the wind and the heat? It turns out this was the 3rd toughest Ironman in history per the attrition rate: 17.7% of the starters didn’t finish. Ironman.com had the following statistics:
Of the 2035 athletes who started the swim, 2033 finished in time to start the bike. Of those, 1,874 managed to get through the hot and windy bike course. 1,830 of those started the run. 1,689 of those athletes finished.



SO WHAT HAPPENED?
I think it was a combination of the following factors:

• Heat and wind
• 90 minutes sleep the night before
• Inaccurate sweat rate…I drank about 160oz of fluid through the bike, however in talking with Marty I found I should have drank about 48oz per hour, which means I should have drank about 240oz.
• I was using a new aero helmet that might not be ventilated enough (right now 100 triathletes who are reading this blog are yelling “Hey Jackass! Nothing new on race day!!”)
• Going too fast on the swim and bike (doubtful, since my HR was below 130 for most of the bike ride)
  So there it is. I’m signed up for the November 2008 Ironman so stay tuned!!

Oh and gratz to Marty, who placed 40th overall with a scorchingly fast 9:48 and will be going to Kona in October for the triathlon World Championship!!