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Archive for April, 2010

Found while trail running: Snapping Turtle

Monday, April 26th, 2010

If you spend enough time outside training, your eventually going to see some crazy/fun stuff. That is why I’ve gotten in the habit of bringing either my Flip video camera, iPhone or still camera on just about any training day other than my speed workouts at the local track.

I was snapping some landscape pics for a blog redesign that I’m working on (to go live sometime in the next few weeks) during a 2 hour trail run on Sunday and ran into a big ‘ol snapping turtle.

YouTube Preview Image

That is all. Just wanted to share this big honking turtle sighting.

Happy Training!

Tags: , | Posted in Running, Training Log, Videos | 3 Comments »

Lessons From The Road

Sunday, April 25th, 2010

I started off a solid weekend of training with my old pal, Kim. I read her blog pretty regularly, so it feels like I see her all the time, but last week we realized that it has probably been three years since we’ve actually ridden together.For someone that lives 5 miles away from me, that is unacceptable. Time flies, eh?

We immediately amended this with a 50 mile ride on Saturday morning. Besides just catching up on all the “life” that happens between each other’s blog posts, I did some major brain picking about tips for ironman training. She rocked a major PR at ironman at Cozumel last year and I absolutely respect her training dedication. I tried to act like a sponge as much as I could during the whole ride.

This is what we decided.

  • I admitted that I NEVER pee on the bike during races, even half ironmans. Nver. This is apparently a problem. I know that I need to get better about my pre-race hydration, and if I’m not peeing on the bike, I still probably haven’t fixed it. The goal is to have to pee somewhere around mile 35-45. This needs some testing, but should give me a good idea of how hydrated I actually am so that I can adjust my intake on the fly and I can rock the run.
  • Don’t spend the day before bumming around the expo without a bottle of fuel in my hand (and probably another in my back pack) to make sure I’m properly pre-hydrated.
  • Keeping a semi-normal social life while rocking an ironman is possible. She is proof. Now I’ve just gotta repeat what she has proven.
  • Pre-lubing with chamois cream is essential.
  • Dropping some $$$ on swim stroke analysis will probably do me way more good than the same amount on coaching, V02 max testing or anything else. My swim stroke is almost definitely the low hanging fruit of places I can improve on to get my finishing times down.

We shot the shit about local triathlon club gossip, her latest boy stories and It also gave me a chance to show off my new Trakkers cycling kit that came in the mail this week. Gotta love some fresh threads.

Playing with my camera while Kim “takes care of business” off in the woods.

Here is to hoping that all these lessons learned transfer into some faster race times this year! I’m starting to feel a little more confident about making the potentially insane decision to coach myself to my first ironman.

Tags: , | Posted in Cycling, Ironman, Life, Nutrition, Running, Training Log, Triathlon | 5 Comments »

Spectating Boston Like A Champ

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010

Today’s training plan was simple.

Get out of bed whenever I felt like it, have breakfast, jump on my bike, point my wheels south towards the Boston Marathon course and go have fun.

I had finally recovered from a pretty wicked stomach bug that kicked my ass this weekend and I was eager to see how my legs really felt without fully committing to jumping back into my training plan.

I arrived at the Newton hills (around mile 20) just as the wheelchair athletes cam rolling through. I kept weaving in and out of the crowds and chasing the runners up the hills. Total Blast.

As more and more runners came in, I made my way closer and closer to the finish line. I even managed to spot two of my Trakkers teammates, Chris and Thor out of the entire mass of 25,000 runners. Because of my fantastic efforts, I have been given the best spectator of the race award by the Boston Athletic Association. That is how awesome my cheering skills were today. Granted if it wasn’t for the  bright green Trakkers gear, it would have been a lot harder, but let’s not dilute the awesomeness of my skills here.

He isn’t a local and I hadn’t actually ever met Chris before, so just yelled out “TRAKKERS!” as he ran by at around mile 23. He flashed a huge smile and kept on flying. I tried to weave around the crowd on my bike to catch him later in the course, but he was too speedy for me. Stupid one way roads. Either way, you’ve gotta love mid-race team meetups.

Congrats to Chris, Thor and everyone else that raced today. Awesome event. Inspiring athletes. Great day out on the bike taking it easy.

Here are some video clips of some of the top Americans powering it up the hill at mile 20 (Ryan Hall and Meb Keflezighi). Totally impressive.

Tags: , , | Posted in Running, Videos | 2 Comments »

Trakkers vs. KSwiss Smackdown

Saturday, April 17th, 2010

If you haven’t been paying attention or following the fuss on Twitter, a ton of news is coming out of the Trakkers crew lately.

Last weekend, the Trakkers pros had a camp down in Texas and Ironman.com had some great coverage of all of the festivities.

Ironman.com Trakkers Camp Coverage:

The big news of the weekend was the throwdown against team Trek-KSwiss. Here is how it went down on Twitter:

  • Michael Lovato: Team Trakkers is calling Trek-KSwiss to a race. We bet $5k our team beats yours at in Knoxville May 9. Be there, or we win!
  • And Trek/KSwiss Tri Team response? Said team co-manager Nick Howe on his handle, TrekSpeed: Anywhere, Any time. Any day. We gladly accept.
  • Julie Dibens: Can’t sleep! Woke myself up laughing cos I dreamt I saw Michael Lovato crying like a baby at the side of the road in Knoxville! Bring it ML.
  • Lovato: Hey Julie, those were tears of joy you saw. I always get emotional after a crushing victory.
  • Lovato: Hey Julie we hope u get your mojo back soon, we don’t want Trek-KSwiss to race without their strongest athlete.
  • Dibens: Michael you are trying to kill me with kindness! I like your style… but I won’t fall for it!

Teams seem to be the trend in the triathlon world. What the Trakkers crew is trying to do is make the team dynamic more than just a group of athletes with the same race kit, but actually start scoring races cross country style rather than just through individual results.

All this hoopla makes me pretty frustrated that I don’t think I’ll be able to make it to Rev3 Knoxville. My work schedule just doesn’t look flexible enough to allow for the 14 hour road trip down to Tennessee. I’m hoping I can pull some last minute trip to race there. Plus, that will mean that I’ll have raced every single Rev3 race since I’m already signed up for Quassy and Cedar Point later this year, which would be pretty awesome…

Audio of Michael Lovato and Richie Cunningham Talking Trash

Tags: , , , | Posted in Triathlon | 2 Comments »

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