Adventures in Triathlon
Monday, July 4th, 2011
Happy Independence Day Everyone!
Hopefully you have some nice weather wherever you are, you get out for some nice swimbikerun and enjoy some post-workout burgers, beers and fireworks with friends and family.
To celebrate, here is my latest mankini design.
Now I’m off to watch the Tour de France, jump into Walden for a swim and head out to spend the day with the (soon to be) in-laws.
| Posted in Life, Swimming, Training Log, Triathlon | No Comments »
Saturday, July 2nd, 2011
Sometimes, you just can’t catch a break. Let’s recap the last 24 hours.
I went out last night to enjoy some beverages with some good friends I haven’t seen in a while. I enjoyed an appropriate amount of beers and had to leave my car and take a taxi home.
I woke up at 5:45 am to realize that:
1) I had a training brick with Kim at 7am
2) My car was 2 miles away
3) My bike still had its trainer tire on it
Ugh. I threw on some running shoes and hauled my hungover body over towards the bar, just to jump in my car and turn back around. Within a half hour, I rushed to swap out my back tire, threw together all my bike and run gear, bolted on my SpeedFil and jumped in the car to go meet Kim.
Showing up late to the parking lot, I throw on my gear, fill up my bottles and pump up my tires.
With two seconds to go before I’m ready to roll and BAM! My front tire blows while still on my bike rack, hanging off my trunk.
Not. Awesome.
Kim and I just laughed and used it as an opportunity for me to teach her how to change a tire. I pulled out the old tube, threw in a new one and pumped it back up.
Kim slyly pointed out “Aren’t you supposed to check if there is anything sharp stuck in the tire?”
First of all, who is teaching who here?
Second of all, she was right. There was a big gash in my tire and as soon as I pumped it back up, it busted again. BAM! Two ruined tubes in 5 minutes. Not. Awesome.
I was out of tubes used her only spare to attempt one last repair. In reality, I just wanted to pack up, head home, and spin away on the trainer. This time Kim had the idea to put a piece of food wrapper inside the tire to cover the gash. That girl is wicked smaht.
45 minutes after I initially wanted to start, we finally roll out of the parking lot. Between the two of us, we had four wheels and no spare tubes. And none of the local bike shops are open yet. Annoying. We decide to ditch the original route and and do repeats of the 10 mile time trial loop in case one of us flats and needs to hitchhike it back to our cars. A great loop, but doing it 5 times back-to-back? Snooze.
The good news is that all my flubs REALLY fueled my bike. I came out of the gates and dropped Kim like a bad habit. She is a strong cyclist, but I had plenty of pent up frustration that she didn’t.
Three hours later, I finished up one of my fastest long rides ever. Not a bad way to end a morning, eh? And it was all held together by a piece of trash inside my wheel…
With all the mess that went on, I decided that my bike must be upset with me for not taking her outside enough lately. To try and make it up to her, I outfitted her with a brand new front tire and gave her a full on wash, degrease and lube job. Hopefully we are back on solid ground…
| Posted in Cycling, Training Log, Triathlon | 5 Comments »
Sunday, May 1st, 2011
It is here! I cracked open the 2011 open water swimming season here in Boston with a dip in the Mystic Reservoir today. I could not be more excited to have a reason to break away from the pool, get some sand between my toes and come home smelling like pond stink instead of chlorine.
And the TYR Hurricane 5 performed like a rock start. It fits me SO much better than my old wetsuit that I bought when I was about 15-20 pounds heavier and is super comfortable. I lubed up my neck, calfs, forearms and lats with some Tri Slide and off I went into the water. I had forgotten how great it feels to be sitting up on top of the water and zooming along effortlessly.
Want to share a lane with me? Jump in. I’ve got plenty of room and promise to be a good lane buddy. I can’t make any promises about the fish or the snapping turtles though.
Good thing the water is warming up, because I just looked at my race schedule and I’ve got my first race next week. Yikes! I hope I’m ready. There is only one way to find out…
Tags: open water swimming | Posted in Swimming, Training Log | 2 Comments »
Thursday, April 14th, 2011
For a lot of reasons, I am really excited to be focusing on the Olympic distance this year. I have been so focused on finishing 70.3s with a decent run the last few seasons that it has been way too long since I last focused on going FAST.
I really sorta miss it. The last year I focused on olys (2007?) I was such a newby, had only done one sprint and just wanted to finish as close to 3 hours as I could. Now I am hoping to transfer as much endurance as I have left over from ironman training and laying some speed and power work on top to make some people who try to catch me hurt. Bad.
The last few years were purely competitive against myself and the clock. I almost never bothered to even look at my AG standings (but when I did, they were never that spectacular). They were fun, but it is time to change it up. Variety, ya know?
For whatever reason, I think I will be able to be more competitive at the shorter distance, and not just with myself, but with other M25-29 ers. I am not quite sure what has got me under that delusion, but I think it has some merit. I am just not sure where, so don’t ask me to explain.
With trying to get myself faster and more powerful, I decided to bring something back to my training plan that I should have been doing more of in the first place: strength training.
I loathe going to a gym, so I invested in a new toy. A 35lb kettlebell. And I decided to name him too, Bally McHurtbody.
The last two weeks me and Mr. McHurtbody have been having a grand ‘ol time together doing swings, lunges, squats, shoulder presses and rows. (We have only just met and aren’t on a first name basis yet.)
And heck, even if it doesn’t make me any faster, hopefully it will help me look less like an emaciated rail thin ironman and more like someone with some actual upper body muscle mass….
| Posted in Training Log, Triathlon | 3 Comments »
My Triathlon Team - Team Rev3 Triathlon
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My Coach - John Hirsch
