Chasing the Impossible

Ironman St. George

2010-05-14T01:50:00.008-05:00

Ironman St. George Race Report

Sometimes our greatest success' can be born from a failure. -- Brett Skyllingstad

While finishing an Ironman triathlon in under 17 hours is by no means a failure, I certainly felt like a failure when I finished Ironman St. George in 14:10:23. It didn't take long after the race for me to realize that I hadn't failed but only let my mind tell me that I couldn't race like I should have. So back to my quote, this is how I feel about IM St. G so here is the rest of the story to explain why.

In late December I knew I had Plantar Fasciitis (PF) and went about trying to heal it. Part of this process was limiting my running. I eventually pretty much beat PF and after having taken some 3 months off from running I began to run again. I was cautious not to overload myself and cause the injury to come back, and slowly started running. I took the approach of running as often as possible but for shorter durations. The frequency of my running would help to build durability. With that being said, I had only worked my running up to an 8 mile run before New Orleans 70.3, then basically the 13.1 in N.O. 70.3 and that was my run training for IM St. G. So there was no doubt that I hadn't put in the time training for the run course on IM St. G. However, I let my mind get the better of me and started telling myself that I had lost all the running base that I had prior to stopping running. Like they always say hindsight is 20/20, well I had lost some base but not as much as I thought. Now I realize I have much more running base than I thought and I was just feeling sorry for myself during IM St. G and used the lack of training as an easy way to justify the fact that I should walk during the marathon as well as ride slow on my bike. Well, I am here to say that I am done feeling sorry for myself and never again will I let my mind get the better of me during my training and racing. No more failures on the race course.

Throughout the course of my training for IM St. G I had to do a balancing act. For the first time I was attempting to train for an Ironman while dating a very special person, Whom I am happily still dating. It was important to me to balance spending time with my girlfriend but also putting in the hours it takes to train for an IM. Some of the other difficult things I didn't expect in my training were, the lack of daylight in January, February, and March. The sun is down early in the day which meant my bike rides were going to be on a trainer which is not very fun. Second was the harsh weather we had in Dallas. This made my long Saturday rides not easy or fun either. We had a record snow fall in Dallas this year in March I think. We had some 12" of snow in 24 hours. Then I rode on Saturday the day afterward in 30 degree weather. It sucked. With that being said the two things I will correct in training for another early season race is to buy a compu-trainer -- http://www.racermateinc.com/computrainer.asp. This will allow me to get in quality rides after work at 5pm when it is dark out. I also think I have figured out how to balance time with the GF and train for an Ironman. At many times I felt bad spending so much time training and not with Morgan. Then I would be with her not training and felt bad because I wasn't training. Now we have it all figured out though. So on to the play by play of the race.

Race Lead Up:

Arrived in St. G on Tuesday night late. Brandon and I got to our Condo and we were quite impressed. Best way to stay is to rent a condo or house. Wednesday we went for a short swim and I put my bike together and we went to check in for the race. Thursday we went for another short swim and short ride. Thursday we went to pick up the GF's from the Las Vegas Airport. Friday night as usual I made some pasta with roasted veggies and had a salad and garlic bread. We had already dropped off T1 and T2 bags and the bike. So all we had to do race morning was drop off the special needs bags.

Race Day:

Woke up at 3:45am and did my usual routine, shower, eat breakfast and got ready. It was cold out that morning maybe in high 40's or low 50's. I knew the water would be warmer than the air too, just barely. We drove to T2 and dropped off the car and our special needs bags. Then we boarded a bus to the swim. When we got there all I did was pump up my tires put some other items in my T1 bag and got in the wetsuit. I forgot my body glide at the condo and didn't put any on my neck before I got into my wetsuit. The Xterra Vendetta suit has a Velcro patch that rubbed my neck till it was bleeding. The funny thing is that I didn't feel it during the swim just when I got out. So off to the swim, I got in the water and waited it didn't feel bad. I had 2 swim caps and ear plugs. Both of these really helped me with the cold water. The water was 58 degrees. The earplugs really helped with not getting dizzy. It is known that cold water can effect your equilibrium when it gets in your ear. I notice this after my first swim on Wednesday and promptly bought ear plugs. They really helped. The swim went fine as usual. The one thing I was confident about my training was my swimming. I did many more 3k swims than I did before IM WI. So here again, when you tell yourself you are confident about your training it pays off. I swam well. I am really surprised with my time because I sighted quite a bit and even did some breast stroke sighting too. I don't believe the course was accurate especially because my perceived exertion on the swim was very low compared to swims I do at the pool and I go slower in the pool and I don't sight in the pool.

Swim -- 2.4 miles -- 1:04:19 -- 1:39/100M

On to the bike, I ran thru transition and was able to see Morgan when I picked up my T1 bag. She got some great pics of me too. It was cold out so I really suited up to ride. I had arm warmers, wool socks, leg warmers, a bike jersey and a wind protective vest. So I started riding and was feeling pretty damn good. I knew I had just PR'd my swim by some 3 minutes, but had a slow transition. I had never been too concerned with transitions in an Ironman, until now. I can do better than 10 - 15 minutes. I should have just gotten dressed while on the bike that way I would be moving forward as opposed to sitting. Within 10 miles I got a flat. So I quickly changed it out. I would say it took me less than 5 minutes to change as well. I was on my way. Before I knew it I was at the start of the first of two loops. First mistake was not hitting the lap button on my powertap. Second mistake was not doing another power test on the bike before the race. I was using old power zones and this would prove to haunt me. I knew this course you have to pace yourself. I had ridden in November and did much better than I did during the actual race. So the whole time I was on the bike I kept saying you better ride slow because you don't have the running base you used to and you will need to save yourself on the run. All I have to say now is what the hell was I thinking. I kept my power in check and rode at roughly 75% of my FT. While this would have been good had I been racing in February when I did my original testing. This was not accurate to my current fitness. FYI I tested myself 2 weeks ago and had a 6% wattage gain in my FT. I am pretty sure I had this fitness before IM St. G too. So I was basically riding in the wrong zone the entire time or closer to 69% of my FT. At the start of the second loop we had some tough headwinds and this was a downer for me, I really wanted to quit but didn't. One of the main reasons I didn't quite was because I already had bought a IM St. G bike jersey and didn't want to have to return it since I didn't finish the race. That's funny too because I joked at Brandon for buying one before he finished the race and said he might jinx himself. Then I ended up getting one too, and it was part of the reason I didn't quit. As the bike came to an end I knew I screwed up, I felt way too good and didn't leave enough out on the course. Especially when I looked at my final time on bike.

Bike -- 112 miles -- 7:35:24 -- 14.77mph average

On to the run, at this point I was tired. 7.5 hours is a long time to be on the bike but I felt good and knew I would be able to make it to the finish. I started my walk run routine and felt pretty darn good. I got the first few miles in and then I started walking up the steep inclines. At this point my feet were really tired. I had ZERO muscle cramps or anything like that. So for whatever reason I felt like since my feet were tired I should walk to draw out the experience. What an idiot. Like Gordo Byrn says an easy bike can be made up for on a 42km run. What I should have done is said to myself, wow Brett you had a really slow bike. You should have been at least an hour faster, why don't you make up for that on this marathon. For the first time I didn't practice what I preach. I let my mind tell me I should walk and take it easy. I did that. I kept doing an overall inventory on my body and the only reason I didn't want to run was because my feet hurt, again no cramping, or GI issues, just tired feet. At mile 20 is when I met up with someone who was from Houston and originally from South Africa. We both began to push each other to run. At this point we were putting in 9 - 10 minute miles. Then with about 2 miles to go I just said the hell with it and started running faster. I was running 8 - 9 minute miles. My first thought was what the hell were you doing dicking around on this course for so long. I finished the race and was glad to be done, but was not very happy with myself because I felt too good.

Run -- 26.2 miles -- 5:08:23 --11:46/mile

The next day when I woke up I felt like a million dollars. That is when I knew two things, I had just raced the hardest IM course in the USA, and I went so incredibly slow that the event had almost no impact on me. I was sore but by Thursday of the next week I had no fatigue. So at first while racing and immediately after I told myself I would withdraw from IM Lake Placid, I soon found a new vigor and really looked at this race as a large training day. I exposed myself to a huge day of training at a very slow rate. This I believe was a positive way for my body to really absorb some great fitness, and the failure of the slow race has also made me want to kill the IM Lake Placid course. I decided the other day while swimming that I am done being afraid of the Ironman distance and it is time to start racing. There is no doubt that I can complete the distance but now it is a matter of how fast. So this next race, I will be pacing a little different. I even have a goal to beat my time from IM Wisconsin. I know if I beat my time at WI on the Lake Placid course I have really made some progress because IM LP is way harder of a course than IM WI. My pacing plan is to go around 80% -- 85% of my FTP on the bike. I also plan to do a field test about 10 days out from IM LP to get proper zones before the race. Then on the run, it is two fold. The first is to negative split the run. Run the second 13.1 faster than the first, no matter the pace, secondly to shoot for as close as possible to a 4hr marathon. So there it is, I have some new goals to reach.

So I am already visualizing success at IM LP and that is why I wrote the quote at the beginning of this post. I am so confident I will succeed at IM LP that I can attribute this success to my failure at IM St. G. Only time will tell. Until then and my Buffalo Springs Race Report.....

New Orleans 70.3 Race Report

2010-04-24T10:34:00.003-05:00

Wow, it has been quite a long time since I have posted anything. I guess I have some other stuff besides training in my life that has been taking up my time. Mostly when I am not training I am spending time with my girlfriend Morgan. We have lots of fun together. Well here is a little download from the past 5 months.

I pretty much beat my plantar fasciitis with the help of Active Release Technique which Dr. Ron Tribendis did for me. Check out his website. He is great and is also a triathlon coach and athlete. He is also racing Ironman St. George. I still have some pain but it ebbs and flows and as long as I wear my strassburg sock it feels pretty darn good.

So how has my training go over the past 5 months well, needless to say I am very weak in my running ability. I didn't start running till the last week in Feburary and wasn't able to build as much base I would have liked. But I knew it would be tough to do IM St. G without running a bunch. But I like a challenge. My biking is mediocre. The rough winter we had in Texas made it really hard to get my riding in as my schedule planned, combine in a bunch of travel in March and Feburary and no daylight savings, I was pretty much hindered by that. Lesson learned, don't do an early season Ironman because with my schedule no daylight savings doesn't work well and I can't ride as much as I would like.

Now on to the race report.

Flew into New Orleans (NO) on thursday night. We got checked in and went out to have some fun. Myself, Morgan, and her 2 room mates were all there. We had some good fun at Pat O'Brians on bourbon street. Overall, that was the second time going to NO and I still have the same opinion of the city. Its dirty, gross, and there are a bunch of trashy people there. Imagine panama city beach trashy people combined with the smell of a bar mat or bar floor at the end of the night and there you have what bourbon street is like. Saturday I met the other team members for a swim at 10am. Unfortunately I slipped on the stairs entering the water and fell right on my arms and but. It hurt really bad. Tommy was right behind me and he said I was less than half an inch from cracking my head. That would have been really shitty so I will take bruised forearms and a scrapped wetsuit over that. The swim went great, the water was very warm.

Saturday I got my bike from Kristen and set it up, I road around for about 10 minutes to make sure everything was working right and in order. I thought I checked it all and everything was good, but alas, something would come to haunt me within the next 24 hours.

Race day--

Woke up at 4am and did my usual routine, shower, eat my oatmeal, get dressed. I was all packed up the night before so I just had my bag ready to go. My swim wave didn't start till 8:15 so I would be the second to last to go. I didn't like this because one it would be much hotter for me on the run since I started an hour later than everyone else. Also I had to wait around at the start for an hour.

Swim--

The swim start was finally here, the water was very shallow for the first 50M or so, so I did dolphin dives out to deeper water. I started right in front of the swimmers and did pretty well. The water was horrible, the waves in the lake were un-real, It reminded me of swimming in Australia. I couldn't believe it either. The lack of buoys was also not good. It made sighting very difficult. The race directors needed to put a lot more buoys in the water than they did. Also the course had a very weird turn and it was really stupid and with the waves it made it very tough to sight on the swim in. Not a fan of the swim on this course mainly because of the course layout and the lack of buoys then add in the waves, it made it horrible. I vote for mass starts and more buoys.

Swim -- 1.2 miles -- 34:35 -- 1:39/100

T1 -- 3:03

In T1 I didn't like the grass and much prefer concrete. With grass you have all this crap that gets stuck to your feet since they are wet and I had to stop and wipe them off with my transition towel. Not a fan of that.

Bike --

My plan for this race was to just go out and have fun, then when the wind was in my favor the whole time I thought it would be interesting to see if I could put in a good time. Well needless to say I did put in a good time but not my best. However, I did realize 3/4 of the way thru the bike my rear brake was pressing against my rim, I was wasting tons of energy. I did however have a normalized power of 213 and beat my 30', 40', 60', and 120' power peak records. I was really pleased with the power file. My HR that came with my power tap is not waterproof and broke since I wore it in the swim. I did the whole bike based solely on power which I do anyways but I also like to check in and see where my HR is at. The reason for this is that power while it is completely un-biased and a 100W is 100W no matter the temperature or terrain or how your body feels, I like to use HR as a gauge for how my body is doing overall, kind of like an engine temperature gauge. I was pretty much riding the whole time in my zone 3 power zone. I wonder how fast I would have gone had my brake not been on. What is weird is that I think when I picked up my bike by the seat post and carried next to my body I may have bumped the brake because everything was fine the day before... O-well, overall the bike was boring terrain, and a shitty course, no hills or no good scenery. Not a fan. The roads were pretty good condition though so that was a plus.

Bike -- 56 miles -- 2:37:26 -- 21.3 mph avg

T2 -- 2:25 -- same gripe about the grass and having to clean my feet off before the run.

Run--

I felt pretty good at the onset of the run and was optimistic about the race, however the first vital check I did of my body was this --

temperature it was really hot there and I could feel it. -- Negative

Energy level -- high and felt really good -- Positive

Attitude -- great -- positive

Calfs -- super tight and felt cramps were possible later in the run

So I started my run walk routine 10' running and 1' walking. This overall really helped to keep the cramps at bay throughout my entire legs. I knew it would be interesting running 13.1 miles when the longest I had ran in some 5 months was 8 miles. I kept a pretty good pace for the first 6 miles around 8:30 - 8:45 then at the half way point I started to really drag and had some cramps in my legs preventing me from running faster. I knew if I pushed it harder that I would cramp. I think I did pretty good with my electrolytes too. I take Enduro-Sharks and they rock. Next time a few more on the bike. However the temperature that day was hotter than I had trained in all year so that I think had some real impact. My body was not acclimated to those temperatures yet. We have had a very mild climate this year compared to last year and really no hot days yet.

I slugged it thru the rest of the run doing my run walk and had to walk a little longer than 1' a few times towards the end. The cramps killed me. I also think the cramps were from fatigue as well as dehydration. My legs just aren't used to running that far. So the marathon in St. G will be interesting. After St. G my training will be very running oriented, so I can have a better race in Lake Placid.

Run -- 13.1 miles -- 1:59:21 -- 9:07/mile

total time -- 5:16:48 -- 31st place out of 166 in my age group.

Not my best race but considering the factors I am pleased. Overall ready to go for St. G and this really helped me know I could put it all together and I recovered very quickly too. I had a massage on Monday and by Wednesday I was good to go. So the most positive aspect of this race is how quick I bounced back.

Next post will be the St. G race report. Till then.

2009: A year in review

2009-12-22T19:47:00.001-06:00

What a year 2009 turned out to be. I want to take this post into a few different directions. The overall purpose of this post is a review of my life in 2009. The items I wish to examine are as follows:
1. Lessons Learned
2. Exciting Moments
3. Looking Forward goals for 2010

To focus on the first, when looking back on 2009, I learned a few things. First starting with work, we made a few mistakes, but none catastrophic. This is very positive, since we can only improve from our current state. My boss and I were able to contribute a good deal of money to our company’s bottom line. I am happy to be associated with this. However, a few items that jump out at me that we have already improved upon and or learned from a mistake are as follows:
1. Ensure accurate communication of Engineers comments on submittals to vendors.
2. When approaching a large project worry more about clarifications in the notes from vendors as opposed to counts and quantities.
3. Allow yourself a good DEDICATED week to scope out a project the size of Deloitte.
4. Clarify startup activities and quantity of days before PO is issued.

In life I learned a few lessons too. Most of them relate around triathlon but some are general.
1. Completing an Ironman isn’t as hard as I thought if you train well for it and pace yourself.
2. Learning your RPE and being able to correlate that with your heart rate and pace is critical to racing an Ironman
3. Mental preparation once again was one of the largest factors in my Ironman training.
4. Taking time off after an Ironman, take more than you think.
5. This one I already knew but I lied to myself and am paying the price now. At the first sign of any pain or twinge that reoccurs for more than a week go to the doctor.
6. Choose your races early and stick to that plan, don’t add stuff at a later date that may jeopardize your future goals.
7. After an Ironman, I personally need to write down a workout plan that significantly cuts volume but still provides with regular physical activity, or sign up a for a new workout class or pursue something other than Triathlon related stuff. This could also be self improvement type things, night classes, etc.
8. Still working on this one, learning to tolerate your job and be happy about the positives and to not be stressed about the negatives. I personally compare my job to other jobs on a regular basis and I am reminded about the all the really positive things about my job.
9. I learned this one late in 2009, but I need to try to make a better attempt at speaking with my family on a regular basis.
10. Nutrition is really important in racing an Ironman
11. Do better with changing my nutrition habits when my training load changes. This year I am still eating too much when I am not training. I will try to have better habits of eating while training so I don’t have issues when I cut my training load.
12. Being very friendly to people will really help you get what you want.
13. Becoming friends with someone even if you don’t like them or have anything in common, will only help you get what you need from them.

Exciting moments or things I will remember for quite some time to come. There were many exciting times in 2009 so I will simply list them as they come to me in no particular order.
1. Finishing my first Ironman
2. Breaking 5 hours in an Half Ironman
3. The birth of my 3rd nephew
4. My little sister getting pregnant
5. Getting my new bike, race wheels, and just recently my powertap
6. Visiting San Francisco
7. Meeting someone special at a concert
8. The divorce of my best friend from growing up and being able to spend time with both of my best friends in Dallas, shortly thereafter.
9. All the new people I met in 2009 and growing my social and work network.
10. Going to Australia
11. Becoming a coach with TTT
12. Making a commitment to do 2 Ironman races and 2 Half Ironman races in 2010.
13. Doing a Triathlon camp with Gordo Byrn and all the others especially Chris McDonald and visiting Utah.
14.

Looking forward: These are the things that I am excited about in 2010, I am very thankful for having all of these things ahead of me.
1. Ringing in 2010 on a Beach in Australia
2. Coaching myself for all my races
3. Becoming a certified Triathlon coach
4. Racing 2 Ironman distance triathlons
5. To all the new friends and acquaintances I meet in 2010
6. The marriage of one of my best friends in July
7. TTT triathlon training camp in Arkansas

If you could sum up the past year in writing here it is. Enjoy. I am very optimistic about 2010 and foresee another very positive year. I think it may turn out to be a year in which I learn more about myself than I have in the past 2 years in Dallas. So Cheers! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

St. George Ironman Training Camp

2009-11-15T20:04:00.012-06:00

A few months ago I signed up for an Ironman training camp in St. George, Utah with Endurance Corner. The purpose of this camp is to preview the Ironman St. George course. So here are my thoughts, comments, etc. on this course along with the comments and thoughts from one pro champion triathlete Chris McDonald and Gordon Byrn.

Day One --

I arrived pretty late at 10:30pm. We had breakfast the next day at 6:30 followed by a lecture then a swim. The lecture was about overall Ironman training etc.

Off to the swim, the swim workout was a simple set that included a 1300M warm up can you say crazy. I only did 400M of the warm plus the main set. I got in 3200M including rest sets in 60 minutes. The main set was pretty solid it went:

400M / 30" RI
4x100 / 30" RI
400M / 1' RI

300M / 30" RI
3x100 / 30" RI
300M / 1' RI

200M / 30" RI
2x100 / 30" RI
200M / 1' RI

100M / 30" RI
2x50 / 30" RI
100M / 1' RI

After that we went back to the hotel grabbed some food then Chris McDonald helped me put my bike together or I should say he did it and I watched. I guess one of the benefits of racing all the time is you learn to disassemble and reassemble your bike quickly. He did it in less than 15 minutes. The whole entire camp I was just in awe that I had the opportunity to workout with some of the best athletes in the world. Even some of the campers were Kona AG qualifiers too.

After lunch we had a short ride thru snow canyon, were we also did a lesson on descending down hills. This was my first taste of some of the scenic views St. George, Utah has to offer. It also included a nice 5 mile climb too. I was well into zone 3 during most of this climb. I was hoping I could do most of the climbing in zone 2 but I could tell this wasn't the case. I am pretty sure though my fitness will allow me to run in zone 3 on t he bike or the run for well over 2+ hours. I was running a compact crank up front - 50/34 and a 12/27 in the rear. My front derailleur's set screws were off and i couldn't use my 27 gear without scraping the chain. So I toughed it out. All the pics are at the end and on my Facebook page so those of you that on Facebook can view if you are my friend.

The descending lesson put on by Chris and Marylin McDonald was excellent. I can now say that I am fearless when I descend. I no longer use my brakes when riding down hill. A couple of key pointers that I got in my own words are as below, one is very visual so maybe I take a picture and include it so you can see it.

The tires want to stick to the road. This is the visual one.

You don't turn when descending you move your weight and body.

You should put your outside foot at the bottom of the pedal stroke and put weight into, this helps to keep you from skidding away. It really works.

Let your inside knee kick out when moving thru a curve just like the high speed motor bike guys do.

Lastly if you have down both of those things and you are still feel like your slipping turn your head into the curve

Also I already knew this one, but it really helps with speed wobble, use you knees to squeeze the top bar.

Read this link for the full article by Marylin McDonald

I was a little nervous about the ride on Saturday considering the hills were longer and the ride itself was longer. My roommate and I were both in the same boat. He had only done 1 Ironman as well and we were both worried everyone would drop us on Saturday's ride.

Friday concluded with a 5 mile transition run. I opted out of this because I really wanted to have a solid Saturday ride and not hinder that by running. We finished the night out with dinner at a great place. Everything but lunch on Friday was included in the cost of the camp. We had all our training nutrition covered, plus dinner both nights. Since we rode all day on Saturday we didn't really have lunch.

Day Two

On day two we would have 3 ride groups, a friendly group, peppy group, and a MAS peppy group. Since I had never ridden hills like this I decided to opt with the friendly group. We rode out at 7:15AM. Gordo took us to the start of the loop and we were off. I took the first loop very easy. I took some pictures and just got into a rhythm. Having never even drove the course I didn't know what was where. My first impressions were that it wasn't too bad. I rode the first loop so slow. It took me 3:09 minutes for the first loop. I missed the second aid station on the course and had to ride the second half of the course without water. Luckily it was mostly down hill and rolling hills. I got refueled shortly after the start of the second loop. We took some pictures here with a small group I was riding in. I was going really slow and I knew it too. The point of this ride was purely to scope out the course. However, I felt really strong on the second loop, so I decided I would push it up a notch and really start to ride. I had come to the conclusion on Friday that when riding these hills there would be no way for me to stay aerobic. So my plan would be to just keep my heart rate as low as possible and stay as fluid and relaxed while climbing. With that being said I will describe the loops the best I can.

Once the loop starts at Hwy 18 and Snow Canyon Rd, it is a steep 8% down hill, you can really move on this. No need to break the road is smooth no curves. Get some free speed here if you can. I got up to around 35mph on this road. Then its a few short rollers before you get thru town. Nothing hard. After you get thru town you start on HWY 91. This where the course goes out into the sticks. 2 lane roads, chip seal, but smooth chip seal if you are used to riding in Texas. It didn't bother me at all. However many of the other folks (most people except like 3 were from Southern and Northern California, the others were from Boulder, CO) complained about the chip seal. As you venture further into the loop, there is a great deal of false flats. These are deceiving. You don't feel like you're climbing, but you really are. They keep coming at you too. Basically when you look at the course map on the website or seen below. The real climbing doesn't start until you get to about mid way up the the left hand side of the loop is where the big climbs are. There are really only 2 big climbs on the course. But don't let that fool you. The course is still really hard from the rollers and the false flats. The hardest part of the course takes about little under an hour to ride. I clocked this on my second loop when I was riding significantly faster. Remember I rode the first loop in 3:09 and the second in 2:26. Huge negative split. I anticipate a bike split well over 6 hours for this course. Gordo's comments were that only the really good pro's would break 5 hours on the bike. Chris McDonald also said that this is one of the hardest courses he has ever done, including France, New Zealand, Louisville, Wisconsin, and Placid. Chris McDonald said he would be around 4:50++ on the bike course here in St. George. Its tough. The hardest climb was a total of 8 minutes long. I rode a 34 - 27 gearing on this hill and my HR still jumped up to 160 on the bike. A big topic of the weekend was discussing power / HR / Pace / and RPE. I plan on buying a power meter for this course and using it to train. I don't think I will be running my aero wheels either on this course. No reason to.

Day Three

Day three was run focused. All I have to say is that it is the hilliest run course I have ever done. I have ran the Austin marathon and that is a joke compared to this course. It seems like you are running up hill the entire time. Both ways, out and back. There are down hills, but in reality they killed me as much as the up hills.

My plan for this course is simple, this is what I got from my weekend, and working with the other coaches. Since I am doing Lake Placid approx 11 weeks after my schedule will be simple. This is a race of endurance, strength, and durability as Gordo says.

After my Ultra 50k race on 12/5/09 I will spend the rest of December doing weight training, hiking with a weighted back pack, and riding big every weekend with hill repeats at the end of each ride, plus Yoga and Swimming. Then January will then be the same thing but I will start to do my runs strictly on hills. I will continue to do big rides as often as possible, and maintain strength training at least 2 - 3 times per week. I am also going to alter my strength training plan to really try to build muscle in these first 2.5 months. I want a good strength to weight ratio for this course, I also want to be durable and injury free. I will be doing as much riding as possible for this course. Swimming will be a once a week or twice a week. Maybe I will pick a few weeks to back off on the biking and do a swim focus week. Not really sure yet, but all I can say is I have a challenge ahead of me training for this course in Dallas. We have no HILLS.... Hope you enjoyed this report.

I'll try this link see if it works for photos of Utah : http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2392572&id=9414770&l=5b443a0bfd

Video BLOG!!!!!

2009-11-05T20:50:00.003-06:00

So not sure how this will work when you get an email but it may not embed correctly, so please click on this website to view the video blog.

http://becomingaironman.blogspot.com/

Enjoy!!!

Chicago Marathon

2009-10-11T13:14:00.006-05:00

This race would be my 4th marathon (if you count the Ironman) and 3rd official marathon. I decided to this race after my 2nd marathon in Austin this past February. I figured that a month after my Ironman I wouldn't have to train for the race and would be able to just run it and have fun. I also have a close friend from high school who just so happened to live like 6 blocks from the starting line. So after my Ironman I struggled with recovery. I really wanted to workout, but every time I would try to do a workout I just felt flat or when I would go for a bike ride it would take me like 45 - 60 minutes to start feeling good. I took this as a sign I wasn't recovered and backed off. I finished my Ironman on 9/13/09 and the Chicago Marathon was on 10/11/09. During that period of time my workouts consisted of these:

4 - runs for a totaling of 21 miles
1 - 750M open water swim
2 - bike rides totaling 40 miles

Well I have to say that I was kind of excited to go and do the marathon. I left for Chicago on Friday on what was supposed to be a 4:30pm flight. Needless to say we didn't leave until about 5:15. I got to chicago at a terrible time for traffic. 7:45pm on a Friday. I sat in the cab for almost an hour. Cabbies are horrible drivers too. They just slam the gas press the break. I much prefer the train. If I would have known it would take me an hour in a cab I would have taken the train since it only takes about 45 minutes guaranteed. Plus I took the train back to the airport and actually enjoyed it more than the cab. Plus its only 3 dollars plus a 7 dollar cab ride to the station, as opposed to 40 bucks in a cab the whole way.

Friday night was good. I spent time with my close friend Matt. We shared many memories and caught up on life. Needless to say we drank about 2 bottles of wine, plus all the beers we had at the pub. I think we went to bed around 3-4am. I was drunk.

Saturday I awoke at about 10:30am. So not much sleep. I can't really sleep in anymore like I used to. I started the hydration process. I left for the expo while my friend Matt who I was staying with stayed and watched college football. While at the expo I got a free stride analysis and video taping session from Brooks. I had never seen my own foot strike pattern on tape. I have a pretty neutral gait. They also were selling huge tubs of gatorade endurance formula for only 20 bucks. They tubs are big, they weigh 3lbs. That is a lot of gatorade. So after that I left the expo and went back. I hated having to take cabs everywhere, when I was only going like 2 or 3 miles. If that. If I lived in that city or new york I would so ride a bike everywhere. That is a no brainier. The expo was really close and cost me like 20 bucks round trip including tip. WTF... I could have walked the 3 or so miles but I figured I'd be better off staying off my feet.

So fast forward. I ate dinner pizza and a salad and was asleep by 9:30am. I woke up at 5:30am. Race start was 7:30. Normal routine, shower, eat oatmeal, drink Gatorade, get dressed. Here come the complaints. Well Chicago decided to have unseasonably cold weather this weekend. WTF.... The past 2 years have been hot for Chicagoans, in the 70 - 80's... I'll take that over the 30's anyday. Now in the 90-100's that is a different story and probably will opt for the cold. Well I awake race morning and it is 26 with a wind chill. I didn't have pants or tights. Rookie mistake. I bet on it being in the high 30's to start and high 40's to finish. It was the opposite. I was freezing the entire time. I left the apt and walked to the start. It was only like a 4 - 6 block walk. Super close. I timed it perfect. I think I waited in my start corral for like 10 minutes. The race gun was off. My race plan was simple, stick close to the 3:40 pace group, chat to as many people as possible since I didn't bring my headphones and kick it up a notch at mile 20 if I felt good. Well needless to say I didn't find too many chatters. I talked with one guy for like 5 miles. Really nice guy. At like mile 7 I started to get really dizzy, but not the kind of dizzy from dehydration but more the dizzy you would get from standing up too fast or if you have ever felt dizziness from vertigo? I started to suspect that it was because I felt really cramped and was really close to so many people. I saw tons of people fall and get trampled by the runners behind them. Even when you start in a specific corral it didn't make much difference. Especially when the streets get narrow. Some turns we I was almost forced to a walk. I quickly pushed my way to the sidewalk and immediately felt better when I wasn't surrounded by people. I drank a bit too much water before the race and had to pee about 3 times during the race.

Basically the miles clicked by. I got to about mile 17 or 18 and was feeling a bit bored. At this point is when it finally thinned out and there were not that many people around me any more. The cold weather really had a huge impact on me. I felt pretty miserable for the last 8 miles or so. I kept shaking and shivering. I was cold no doubt about it. At this point my clothes were wet too, this didn't help especially when the wind blew. I stuck to my normal nutrition plan and had 4 gels the entire race. Plus Gatorade and or water at just about every aid station. At mile 19 I started to get a second wind. The sun was out and I thought that I would pick up the pace and see what happens. Well I did well. The miles kept clicking off. My left hip was tight as always. The cold however didn't help with keeping it stretched out. I stopped a few times from miles 17 - 25 to stretch it. Since I didn't have any real goal on time I didn't really care. It wasn't till mile 20 that I started doing the math on if I could PR the race. Well this is why I picked up the pace. I had a lot more ups and downs in this race than normal. I think that is because I didn't train for it and didn't have it as a goal race.

Well here are my mile splits:

Total Time -- 3:40:56

Average pace per mile -- 8:25/mile total average HR 156

Mile -- AVG HR -- Pace

1 -- 150 -- 8:12
2 -- 151 -- 8:26
3 -- 151 -- 8:13
4 -- 149 -- 9:00 --- bathroom break
5 -- 155 -- 7:51
6 -- 152 -- 8:05
7 -- 149 -- 8:22
8 -- 150 -- 8:36
9 -- 152 -- 8:17
10 -- 150 -- 8:13
11 -- 152 -- 8:15
12 -- 155 -- 8:30
13 -- 157 -- 8:29
14 -- 156 -- 8:19
15 -- 156 -- 8:18
16 -- 157 -- 8:47
17 -- 155 -- 9:00 -- this is when I was feeling really cold, bored, and stretched my hip
18 -- 155 -- 8:54
19 -- 154 -- 8:46 -- then I realized I could possibly PR if I would just suck it up and fight the cold
20 -- 161 -- 8:24
21 -- 163 -- 8:12
22 -- 164 -- 8:09
23 -- 160 -- 8:30 -- walked thru an aid station
24 -- 161 -- 8:21
25 -- 157 -- 9:00 -- this is funny, I was not motivated and just wanted to quit, not from being tired or cramping but because I didn't care.
26 -- 168 -- 7:44 -- this is what I call a kick. I should have done that at mile 25, I had too much energy
.2 -- 174 -- 1:38

So all in all this was great finish to my racing season of 2009

I did 2 half Ironmans, 1 sprint tri, 1 Ironman, 2 marathons.

What is next for me????

Well next is my Ironman St. George Utah training camp shown here. This is 11/12 -- 11/15
http://www.endurancecorner.com/services/st_george_ironman_camp

maybe the Austin marathon on 2/14/09 ?????? I don't have a real reason to do it.

Then after that is Ironman 70.3 New Orleans on 4/18/10

Then Ironman St. George, Utah on 5/1/10

Then Buffalo springs Ironman 70.3 on 6/27/10

Then Ironman Lake Placid on 7/25/10

Probably Longhorn Ironman 70.3 sometime in October of 2010 or just take the rest of the year off and run some winter marathons. Maybe I'll do the Texas Quadruple that year of San Antonio Marathon in November, then Dallas White Rock Marathon in December of 2010, then Houston Marathon in January, then Austin marathon in February.

I plan on signing up for Ironman Louisville this year. My team has a few folks heading there so I will go and be a helper and also ride and swim the course. There is also possiblity for Ironman Cour D'Alene in Idaho too. We'll see how the 2 Ironmans in one year go this summer.

Until, then the blog will be pretty slim unless I just feel like writing. However in case you don't know I won't be going home to Cincinnati this year for Christmas. I will be going to Australia to visit a friend from high school, Reynold. Its a once in a lifetime opportunity. He has been living there for like 2 years and he lives on the beach.... So I am sure my 19hrs on the plane ride back will allow for some writing. Until then...

Cheers.

My Ironman Movie

2009-09-27T21:53:00.003-05:00

So ever since I started training for the Ironman I thought that upon completing the race I would make a movie about my experience and how endurance sports have really changed me. I put together a movie and it is now on the internet. It can be found here on my coaching page from my team. Oh yeah by the way I am now a coach with Texas Triple Threat and look forward to helping tons of people out in the future. I only hope I can also help people achieve the goals and dreams the same way my coaches have.

So the link that contains the video is on my coaching page, simply scroll down and click on the "Becoming an Ironman" link. I would grab a drink and some popcorn cause it is about 30 minutes long. But enjoy it. This is my way of telling everyone out there anything is possible...

http://www.texastriplethreat.com/coachingservices/coachbrettbio.php

The big show!!!!!

2009-09-14T19:09:00.016-05:00

So as I said in my last post the next time I would write in my BLOG would be for my race report. Well here it comes.

On Friday I went to packet pick up and also got my bike from the Tri Bike Transport. I met a super nice lady named Leslie from Dallas when I commented on her tri top and the Enduroshark Salt Pill logo. These are the salt pills I have been taking and love them. They have tons of salt in them, 255mg to be exact. She ended up giving me a ride to the places I needed to go when I told her I had been sick the previous days. So kind of her. I am sure I will run across her again sometime since she lives in Dallas. Friday was a bit more hectic than I needed with all of my family arriving and spent a little more time on my feet than I should have. I also went to the Athlete dinner and meeting on Friday night. Food wasn't bad and it was a cool part of the experience. One guy lost 212 lbs while training for the Ironman. This is why triathlons are cool.

So on Saturday all I had to do was drop off my T1, T2 bags, and my bike. This was all that I wanted to do too. I was successful at this as well. The entire afternoon I spent with my feet up relaxing and napping. We finished dinner by 6:45 which was perfect since that would give me 12 hours till race start. However this wouldn't really matter cause some how I knew I would be in the porta-john at some point on Sunday.

The race day had arrived. I had a wake up call for 3:45am. I showered, ate my oatmeal and banana and packed up the last of my things. I picked up my 2 bottles of red bull mixed with water that would be in my special needs bag on the bike. The hotel was supposed to freeze them, but they only put them in the fridge o-well.

We parked and got to the race start early. I bumped into Casey Z. and Sam M. as well as Richard B. This was nice to see them. Something that was really weird about this race that is different than all other ones I have ever done was how I felt on race morning. Normally on race morning I am nervous and worried about what is going to happen. However for some reason this race I was missing this feeling. I was not at all nervous about the race. I was so confident that I would finish the race. There was never any doubt in my mind about finishing the race. In the days leading up to the race I was more nervous about getting to the start. Usually before a race I kind of dislike the swim and don’t look forward to it. However this feeling was gone. I feel that much of my missing feelings were due to the large amount of mental preparation I did for this race. I had spent the last 9 months mentally imagining what the race would be like, how I would feel and what would go thru my mind on race morning. I was very confident in my training and knew it would take me to the finish line. I approached the event as 3 separate events, an early morning 2.4 mile swim, a late morning summer bike ride of 112 miles, and an afternoon jog of 26.2 miles.

I walked to the swim start and got in line. I got in the water at about 6:45, I was tired of waiting around on dry land and wanted to get this thing started. I wish it would have started at 6:30 as opposed to 7am. I floated in the water till the cannon went off at 6:50 for the pro athletes. That was cool. They took off. The next 10 minutes went by very fast. The swim start was actually a bit anticlimactic for having some 2,406 athletes all start at the same time. I started right at the front of the pack. I didn’t care about hitting people or what not. I knew I would swim 1:45 – 1:50 per 100M so I knew I would be near the front. One thing that was very interesting about this swim was that how little energy and effort I exerted to maintain that pace. In training I was supposed to do a few 5km swims but never did. My longest swim was only 3200M. The Ironman swim is 3860M give or take. I didn’t even have to work hard to keep my pace at all on the swim. I think this had something to do with the amount of other people in the water all swimming the same pace. I didn’t mind bumping into people too much. Pretty typical for any race, in the that at the first turn we all pretty much stopped swimming and were doing a doggie paddle. One thing I did notice was that other people’s swim stroke really has a great deal of force when they go thru the water. I found that I swim just as fast as everyone else but when my hand enters the water and pulls thru I do it very gently, others not so much. When a few people would stroke it felt like they were punching the water, I don’t get it. Swimming is all about technique and the force of your hand into the water and thru the water isn’t as important as its positioning. So for instance when I would stroke and hit someone else’s back or leg it would simply be a gentle tap as opposed to a forceful blow. So the swim ended as quickly as it began. I was out of the water and felt great. I had the wet suit strippers pull my suit and I began the run up the helix.

Swim Time: 2.4 miles – 1:07:02 – 1:46/100M

40th place in my Age Group, 216th overall

On to T1, this was weird, I had never done a transition where everything I need was in a bag. My brother in-law was working T1 as a volunteer and he helped me do everything. However I didn’t really know what to do first when I dumped everything out of my bag. I stopped for a second and gained my thoughts and did this:

Dry off,
Put on socks
Put on chip
Put on shoes
Eat twix bar
Eat potato chips
Drink 5 hr energy
Put on HR monitor
Put on helmet
Put on sunglasses
Put on race belt

I did all of these things and took way longer than I needed to. I also kind of walked part of the way from swim finish to T1. I was just stopping and looking around and experiencing the atmosphere. I am disappointed with my times in this respect but really glad I did it. I enjoyed the moment. All I could keep thinking was that it was really happening, I was on my way to becoming an ironman. It was so surreal. The next one, I won’t be wasting time. Next time in and out, and also practice my transition with everything in a bag. Luckily Jeff my brother in-law was there to help. I really appreciated everything he did for me this weekend.

I ran outside and once again stifled by the transition set up. I literally had to run from one end of transition all the way to the other end. So I mapped it on Google earth and it was about a .15mile run from the door of T1 to my bike.

T1—14:24 – next time 5 minutes or less…

So I was off on the bike. As soon as I started pedaling on the bike I had my left calf/hamstring get a bit tight on me. This was the same pain I had about 3 or 4 weeks before the race. It went away and I was fine the weekend before the race but for whatever reason it came back. It wasn’t a show stopper but also something I didn’t want to get worse as the day went on. For this reason I was a bit more conservative than I would have been if I hadn’t had this tightness. It was more important to finish than finish fast. I had spent 9 months training and wasn’t going to waste this opportunity.

The bike was easy as I remember it. No real hills at all. Simply rollers, up and downs. There were 2 actual climbs and they are short. My hill repeats made these seem super easy, even at mile 90 or so on the second pass. I smiled all the way up the hills and got out of the saddle and just danced on the pedals all the way to the top. My nutrition plan was this for the race. I was taking EnduroShark Salt pills http://enduroshark.com/ These are great. They have almost 255mg of NaCl in them, plus tons of other sodium. I was taking about 1 – 2 of these per hour and a few extra in the last hour. I started out with powerbars every 20 minutes. I ate 3 powerbars over the first 3 hours or so, plus tons of Gatorade. This would put my calories around 300 – 400 per hour. I pissed twice on the bike while riding and once in the porta john. I picked up my special needs bag at mile 57 or so and grabbed a quick drink of coke, handful of chips, 2 waterbottles with red bull mixed with water and my 5hr energy. I also ditched my socks at this point to. I don’t know why but I didn’t want to wear them right then, even though I wore them 60 – 70% of the time on my long rides in training. I finished the second loop and started back for T2. There was a stretch of straight road that had a headwind on the way back for about 3 miles and this was around mile 105 – 108 or so, this was the worst part of the race. I wanted to drink and eat a bunch more but knew I couldn’t because I would be running in like 20 minutes and didn’t want a full belly. Then I lost my last water bottle with like 3 miles to go and was really thirsty and didn’t have any water. This was all happening but as soon as I realized it I was in T2 and done with the bike. Now on to the mentality of lets just go jog for a few hours and then you will be an Ironman.

Bike Split

112 miles – 6:12:46 – 18mph Average

Heart Rate Average for bike course 138

T2, I ran in grabbed my bag and sat down with Jeff. I immediately put him to task of fixing my race belt. It came apart on the bike. He fixed it while cleaned up with wet ones. I put my gels in my pockets, visor, shoes; race belt fixed by Jeff and was ready to run. I ran out and got tons of more sunscreen slathered on me. That is one thing I didn’t get was sunburned. I was coated the entire time I raced. I started off running very easy about 9:30 – 10 minute pace. I felt really smooth and strong. I knew the first order of business was finding a porta john to take a crap. I knew this was coming and figured I better get it out of the way early in the marathon so I could just run. This was accomplished. I continued chipping away at the miles, holding myself back a bunch. I felt a bit of tightness in my left calf, but all in all I was again being really conservative. I wanted to finish. I ended up in the porta john again at mile 5 or so. I expected this to happen, a normal day for me I am on the toilet a few times anyway.

T2 --- 10:57

The run was weird, since my goal was to finish under 13 hours at this point since I knew the 12 hours was out of the question. In hindsight I went way to slow and felt way to good at the finish. However, I did get to enjoy the entire run. When you see pictures of me on the run you can tell how good of a mood I was in. I mean honestly, I was so happy that the day had finally come and in a few short hours of jogging, I was going to be an Ironman. I absorbed all that was Ironman Wisconsin on that run. At about mile 20 Jeff started running with me. We kept a decent pace. I was bit tired at mile 20 but still kept my cool. I walked thru aid stations and up the 2 steep hills, but other than that I was pretty much doing a slow jog the entire time. As I write this I am a bit ashamed of my run time seeing as I held so much back, I could have done tons better. I can make up for it in my next one. I want my next Ironman marathon portion to be just under 4 hours or as close to 4 hours as possible. I think this is completely within my reach too. My only concern about my next 2 Ironman run portions is the hills. This could prove challenging. My nutrition on the run was gatorade, water, salt pills, coke, pretzels, chips, and bananas. I ate one gel on the run and didn't want to eat another one. To be honest, I was just flat out hungry, all I really wanted to do was just stop and eat a restaurant. I wasn't bonked, I still had plenty of energy and felt pretty damn good the entire time on the run. The bananas were the best. Once I ate a few of these I felt much better. One thing I hated about the run was the fact that they had orange gatorade on the run. They also had orange gatorade on the bike. That is a rookie mistake for such a high profile race. Orange gatorade was the last thing I wanted to drink was orange gatorade. I had probably drank like 2 or 3 liters of this on the bike. It didn't taste good to me at that point.

Run Split

26.2 miles -- 4:43:20 -- 10:49 / mile

Heart Rate Average -- 142 -- (I should of went a bit harder, I can run up to 170bpm and still be aerobic)

Total Time: 12:28:27

Swim Time: 2.4 miles – 1:07:02 – 1:46/100M

T1—14:24

112 miles – 6:12:46 – 18mph Average

T2 --- 10:57

26.2 miles -- 4:43:20 -- 10:49 / mile

After the race, I felt pretty damn good. I was so happy with myself. As you can see from my pictures I was really happy after I crossed the finish line. It was pretty emotional for me, I can safely say their were tears of joy as I crossed that finish line. I had imagined that moment of coming up the last hill on state street turning the final corner and seeing the finish line so many times over the past year. I had played that moment thru my head more times than I can count. After the race I went straight to the food tent. I was hungry. I had a coke, 3 slices of pizza, and some cookies. I was extremely hungry on the last part of the run. I met back up with the family took a picture or 2 and then had my Dad go get my stuff from transition. Then they informed me they moved the car we had parked that morning a few blocks away. This was horrible news to me. That morning we parked 1 block from the finish line. Perfect spot. Now we had to walk like 4 blocks to the car. This sucked, but moving the car did allow my brother in-law to see me on the bike, so I was okay with that. By the way, Thank you so much Jeff for everything. Taking me to the hospital and helping me out when I was sick. Being there in Transistion both times for me and running with me the last few miles. This was a huge help for me. Thanks a bunch.

All in all, this was a terrific experience. I can't wait to do another one. I really enjoyed training for it and racing it. I probably will still use my blog to post updates about different things from time to time. I will definitely use it for all my race reports too.

HERE IS MY VIDEO LINK --- VIDEO LINK, (The link isn't working yet because Youtube won't let me put up a video longer than 10 minutes) My ever so gracious brother in law Jeff will be hosting the video for me on his website. I will update the link when it it is up. There are way more pictures in the video, so I suggest you watch it.

The time has come and look what happened

2009-09-10T15:56:00.004-05:00

Well, I decided I would give a quick update to everyone as I sit here in Wisconsin. I made thru almost 9 months of training without any serious injuries or set backs. My last 2 months of Training were very positive and strong months of training. Wouldn't ya know, the Tuesday before the race I have come down with some type of viral infection. Since Tuesday 9/8/09, I have been running a fever, sore throat, achy, and all the other great feelings of a viral infection. So I flew up to Madison yesterday evening and I was still running a fever of 102. I would sleep in about 1 - 2 hour increments, waking up every so often either in a cold sweat or because my throat would hurt so much from swallowing. I decided I should go to the ER today. I wanted to go to the ER because I knew they would give me an IV ( I got 2L worth of IV fluid), as well as a dose of steroids to take the swelling of my tonsils down. An urgent care type place wouldn't do this. Both of these things made me feel much much better. They ran tests for MONO and Strep, both came back negative. However they are running a 48 hour test for strep. In the mean time they decided to give me some penicillin just in case the 48 hour test came back positive. This way I would have 48 hours of antibiotics in my system. I am feeling better already this afternoon. I also got some pain medicine which will help me sleep better and help with the aches. I feel confident that I will be able to race. I may not be 100% on Sunday, but I am gonna get thru it one way or another.

What is interesting is that I haven't had a cold or anything in over 2 years. The last time I was sick was in late July of 2007. I came down with strep throat, and all the same symptoms I have now. Would you believe that this was 2 days before my first Olympic distance triathlon? Funny huh??? I did the same thing then, I went to the ER, they gave me an IV, Steroids and antibiotics. I did my race 2 days later and finished. It wasn't by any means a stellar performance, but I still finished, and was eager for more. Something tells me that this weekend will be much the same.

What is also weird is that I know 2 other triathletes who said they had the same thing happen to them right before their Ironman races. I think it has something to do with the tapering and not working out as much in the past few weeks, I don't know.

I have this funny feeling that the next time I write in this blog, it will be my Ironman Race Report.

Until then.

Cheers

Mentally Challenged

2009-07-30T21:26:00.005-05:00

So the big day is some 44 days away. This week I took another big step. I signed up for Ironman Lake Placid. This race is held in Lake Placid, New York. It will be my 3rd Ironman race. It is 2 months and 25 days after my 2nd Ironman. This is really going to require a huge base to be built up prior to my 2nd Ironman. So much of a base that I can quickly recover from Ironman Utah, and get right back to training. It's a good thing that Todd will be able to help me with this. The course is pretty challenging with some good climbs on the bike and run. Check out the website Ironman Lake Placid. After signing up for this race, I began to think back to my first few triathlons, and I realized that my first season of triathlons was very similar to my first season of Ironman races. Back in the spring of 2007, I signed up for some 5 triathlon races in one night before ever having raced in one. I just gotten a new bike and I wanted to make a commitment to training and jump head first into the triathlon world. Well here I am doing the same exact thing with the Ironman distance race. Signing up for 3 Ironman races before ever completing a single one. I think this speaks a great deal about who I am and can in few words explain how I tick. When I put my mind towards a goal, I go all out to see it thru. Well I am here to say that this is the plan. I have a few other goals in my future, but haven't really committed to any of the fully yet except the Ironman. Those are in no order:

Cross Country bike ride
50 mile Ultramarathon
100 mile Ultramarathon
Racing in every Ironman in the USA and Canada....... (I'm closer to this one than any, and probably will achieve this in the next few years)

So back to the point and title of this article.

I haven't been posting much lately, but seeing as my race is so close, I really wanted to reflect back on what I have learned from my training and share this with others. Making the decision to train for an Ironman is a big commitment. Not only a commitment of time, but money, and even a psychological commitment. I have gotten to a point in my physical training where, I just expect to go out and train everyday, day after day. There are many days where the easy thing to do would be just sleep in or just take a day off. There are days when you wake up sore and don't wanna run. You have to push yourself out the door and work hard. Racing an Ironman is something you can't fake. You have to put in the time and effort, otherwise you will fail. Before my training really began, I didn't know what to expect, week after week, day after day. I just would get my schedule from Todd, and work the plan. As Todd says, plan the work, work the plan. Now, I kind of know what to expect from him. The biggest challenges so far in training for this distance race have not really been logging the miles, but something else. The two biggest challenges are as listed below. So anyone thinking about an Ironman, start planning on how to figure out these mysteries.

Ironman Race Nutrition
The psychological aspect of training

The hardest thing so far, that I haven't figured out 100% is my nutrition on the bike. Each weekend is another experience, and to be honest, the only thing that I can control is what I put into my body and how far I ride or run. Everything else is just sit back and see what happens. I would say that I have about 65 - 75% plan for nutrition on the bike. But I have 45 days, to keep experimenting. I don't suspect that I will have figured out my nutrition strategy 100% even on race day. If it is like my Half Iron distance races, I will have to do a few before I perfect it. No harm about this and I'm really not that worried about it either. What ever happens, happens.

The other very difficult thing is purely psychological in 2 different aspects. The first aspect is how you have to push yourself to new limits almost every day. For your first Ironman what do you expect? You are going to be training more than you ever have in your life. So you just have to accept this and know that you got to put in the time to achieve your goal. It can be challenging of course, but don't you think the race will be challenging too? Whenever I get down about my training, feel frustrated, or feel like quitting during a long day, I just suck it up and think to myself, that I KNOW I will feel the same way in Wisconsin too. By continuing to overcome, those days when you feel like quitting, I am building a library of memories that I can draw upon during that fateful day in Madison. While racing in Madison, I am going to want to stop, walk and probably quit, but every time that happens, I'll just stop and think about the long days I spent all summer training and remind myself that the pain will pass just keep moving, and the faster you move the sooner you'll be done. This is very important for me, and I feel I have truly grown in my ability to push thru pain and go to new levels.

The second psychological aspect is POSITIVE VISUALIZATION. I never really realized it until I read some articles in this months Triathlete magazine, but I have been relying on this for so long. Ever since my first race. Many people ask me what I think about when I got out and ride for 5 hours or run for 2+ hours. Well to be completely honest the below items are really what goes thru my head in no particular order:

overall body feel / pain. etc.
reminding myself to eat and drink
singing lyrics to songs I'm listening
thinking about the lyrics to songs and what they mean
visualizing myself at all the points during the Ironman and how I am going to feel.
The feeling I am going to be feeling at the finish line of IM Wisconsin

Items number 5 and 6 are what I mean by positive visualization. I visualize my self racing Ironman Wisconsin. I put myself in Madison mentally every day. I am thinking about the 2 laps on the swim in the lake, while I am in the pool. I concentrating on relaxing and finding a groove in the lake. While on the bike or doing hill repeats, I am thinking about climbing those rolling hills in the farm lands of Madison. Thinking about what I am going to feel like after loop #1 heading into loop #2. Trying to relax and be positive. Thinking about relaxing riding out in the first 20 - 30 minutes of IM Wisconsin bike leg. Thinking about mile 18 on the run in Wisconsin and knowing that the only thing that is going to be running thru my head is how bad I feel, how much I just wanna stop sit down and quit and how I am going to overcome this feeling and keep moving forward for those last 8.2 miles. I think about this all the time. I think about all the lows that I am going to feel on the run and how I can over come them. All of these thoughts are truly a huge part of my training. I really feel that by thinking these thoughts, I am preparing myself psychologically for everything that may happen during the race. Without this mental preparation, I feel I would not be ready for the race. This positive visualization is something I highly recommend to all athletes, because it will really pay dividends. I have done it for every race, I have ever competed in and sometimes during the actual race, I sometimes get a deja vu feeling wash across me. This can be a bit eery, but that disappears, and it soon it is an advantage that I have over other competitors, and my own self.

So think about it, and see if you can apply that your life.

Buffalo Springs Ironman 70.3

2009-07-01T07:42:00.009-05:00

Buffalo Springs Ironman 70.3 Race Report

So it wasn’t but a year ago that I raced at the Buffalo Springs Lake Triathlon (BSLT). This race is a 70.3 race. It is a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike ride, and a 13.1 mile run. Last year I blew up. It was one of the most difficult races I had ever done. I had to resort to walking on the run. My legs were cramping, it was rough. Follow this LINK for a recap of that race. This year would be a different story. My only goal for this year was to cross the finish line feeling fresh, and have a solid run. No walking. Well this year I did that and more.

In the days preceding this race temperatures across Texas were almost setting records. It had been over 100 degrees for the whole week. In triathlons as in life you can’t control the weather so you take what you get. I was ready to race in the heat. I train in the heat all summer. There is no way around in Texas. It’s something you learn to live with and actually, if you are like me kind of like. People always say how do you go exercise in this heat, it’s so hot out. All they do is complain. Well, I have a simple way of making myself adapt to it. I constantly tell myself all day long, all year long, “It’s not that hot out” By repeating this year round, I have adapted to the temperatures and it really doesn’t feel that bad to me. I routinely train at some of the hottest times of the days. I run after work and ride after work anywhere from 4pm to 9pm. So I like many others were expecting to see 100 degree temperatures on race day. Since there was a great deal of potential for extreme heat, I planned out all week to be really cognizant of my hydration. I was eating lots of fruit, apples, grapes, taking salt pills all week, and drinking lots of water and Gatorade. I would say each day I easily drank close to 7 liters of water. On Friday alone I drank / ate the following things:

1. 1 Liter of water with breakfast
2. 8 oz of skim milk (.25L)
3. 32 oz Gatorade (approx 1 liter)
4. 32 oz Gatorade (approx 1 liter)
5. 1 gallon of spring water ( 3.78L)
6. 1 gallon of spring water with NUUN (3.78L)
7. .75 lbs of grapes
8. 2 apples
9. Plus a few glasses of water with dinner (approx 1L)

Total for the day: 12.75 liters of fluids

I awoke on Saturday morning and was so hydrated that my urine was completely clear. This actually made me really happy. This meant my hydration plan was working. It just so happened that the God’s were happy with us on race day and gave us an almost perfect day. Upon waking race morning it was a mere 70 something degrees. The forecast called for 70’s till after 12pm. This was a bonus. They also called for rain, not so good, but not bad either. Recall last year it rained the entire time too. So I had experience with this. I had a good pre-race dinner of pizza, salad, glass of wine and lots of water. I was in bed and asleep by 10pm. We had our alarm set for 3:30AM. Super early.

Woke up and did my normal routine, ate my same breakfast and was ready to pack up the car. I wheeled my bike out and notice I had a flat front tire. Not good. So Prepared to change it quickly, I stripped the tire and pulled the inner tube and inflated it to see where the leak was. It was at the valve stem. This meant I had to change the tube. I pulled off my valve extender only to find out the spare I had was no good with the valve extender. I was glad this happended not during a race. The local bike shop was able to fix me up once we got to the race. I have since bought the right tubes. I got to the race set up transition and started waiting in line for the toilets, the line was too long for me to keep waiting, so went to the swim start. This would prove to be an issue later. Swim went fine as usual. My splits were as follows:

Swim 1.2 Miles – 34:15 = 1:46 / 100m

On to the bike, my plan was to hold back a bit on the bike so that I would be able to have a solid run. I feel that I could have ridden the course much faster, but didn’t want my run ruined either. Keep in mind the elevation profiles for this course are shown below. It is a tough course. Luckily there was no heat. On the bike I felt great on every climb and was able to keep my heart rate very low. I had a 17 minute timer on my watch to remind to eat, drink, and take a salt pill. I wanted to try to get almost 400 calories in per hour. T his would include Gatorade too. Here was my nutirition plan in order of what I ate.

My total bike split was : 56 miles --2:44:58 -- 20.4 mph Average

1. Chocolate Cliff Bar – I ate this right out of transition – 240 calories
2. Gel – 110 calories
3. Gel – 110 calories
4. Gel – 110 calories
5. Peanut Butter Powerbar – 240 calories
6. Vanilla Powerbar – 240 calories
7. Gel – 110 calories
8. Cliff Shot Blocks – 190 calories

Total food calories on the bike: 1460 calories – total ride time less than 3 hours, so I met my plan of 400 calories an hour.

As far fluids went, I started with my aero bottle filled with NUUN, 2 shorty bottles with Gatorade and 1 bottle with water. I did 2 gatorade bottle hand ups and 2 water hand ups. So total fluids drank was about:

Gatorade / NUUN – 88 oz
Water – 48 oz
I took 2 – 3 salt pills every other 17 minutes.

I have come to the conclusion that the more I eat on the bike, the better I can run. Plain and simple. I have repeated this time and time again in my training on the weekends. The plan for Ironman Wisconsin is to eat on a similar time pattern. I also plan on having some sort of solid food / sandwich / wrap / or something in my special needs bag and eating that prior to completing the first of the 2 two 47 mile loops.
I was very positive about my ride. I have decided that for any races or long rides going forward, I will not use my speedometer. I will simply ride with cadence and heart rate. This is much better for me as I don’t get frustrated with average speed and or mph.

Off the bike and into T2. I had a decent transition. I had accumulated all kinds of rocks and debris in my bike shoes during the ride. Since the last 16 miles it rained somewhat hard on me. Upon arriving in T2, my shoes and socks were soaked with water. Luckily I race in my ZOOT shoes which have holes in the soles and allow water to drain very efficiently. I plan on purchasing a pair of the newer versions for IM Wisconsin. The newer versions have more padding and will help on a marathon distance run.

Out of T2, I started clicking off the miles and just wanted to get in a groove. It is funny for me now, that unless I really push myself hard on the bike, I don’t even feel like I have ridden when I go to run. Or the fact that I have been doing at least 1 or 2 bricks per week, I got into a groove very quickly. My heart rate was extremely low and I was still running a sub 8-minute mile pace. Then I got this feeling, that wasn’t good. I had to go shit. So I stopped at mile 3 and took 4 minutes to run to the shit house and go. I knew I would be able to run better if I did this. This was upsetting because I wanted to go again before the race but couldn’t because of the line. I also didn’t have enough time because of the flat tire shit that happened. Lesson learned. I need to allow even more time to get to the race venue than expected. This poses a problem when carpooling with others. I generally always like to error on the side of caution and would get to the race venue as soon as it opens, but when others are with you this is always not an option. So with that episode behind me, I kept running. I met up with a good mate from Austin, TX who had formerly lived in Australia for the past 6 years. We ran together from mile 5 to 13.1. We were running strong and great. As you can see from the below splits. I took 2 gels on the run, Gatorade, water, and coca cola at almost every aid station. I also took 4 salt pills. Check out my splits and HR’s below.

Mile Splits:

Pace / Mile -- HR
1. 7:52 – 143
2. 7:50 – 144
3. 10:21 – 140
4. 8:52 – 147 (I forgot to hit my watch included a hill)
5. 7:47 – 150 (this was short from previous mile)
6. 7:42 – 151
7. 8:06 – 150
8. 7:31 – 152
9. 7:28 – 150
10. 8:05 –153
11. 7:44 – 150
12. 7:41 – 154
13. 7:32 – 157
14. :26 – 161

TOTAL HALF MARATHON SPLIT: 13.1 miles -- 1:45:06 -- 8:01/mile

So all in all this was an awesome run. My time would have been 3:45 seconds less had I not go to use the bathroom. This would have put my overall time for the half down around almost 1:41. This is excellent. I am extremely pleased with this and how fresh I felt during the run. No cramping at all on the run. I have never ran like this before in a race. I feel very confident that on an easier course I can probably run a 1:35 – 1:40 half marathon after riding 56 miles.
With all that being said, I am now toying with racing Longhorn 70.3 on October 25th, in Austin, TX. I did it last year and I think I can own the race. I think I can break 5 hours by a larger margin than I did in Galveston earlier in the season. Who knows, if I do well enough and people don’t show for the awards, I may get a roll down slot to the Ironman World Championship 70.3 in Clearwater, Florida. This is the worlds champion and you have to qualify to race it. At BSLT, the slots rolled down to 13th. I got 17th in my age group. I plan on racing BSLT again next year and hope to break 5 hours there as well. The way I see it a 22 minute improvement in only one year is astronomical. If I can continue that pace for the next 5 years, I very well may be able to qualify for Kona or Clearwater at some point in the future.

My first try at a short story....

2009-06-05T21:42:00.005-05:00

Sitting on a old dirty couch in their bedroom at the Lambda Chi house were two friends, Mason and Bill. One with his legs on a rickety coffee table that was fashioned out of brown wicker basket with a piece of 3/4" MDF screwed to the top to cover up the weaving of the wicker and provide a level surface to set the beers, cigarette lighters, and ash trays. The other friend was simply slouched down so far that he might as well have been lying on the ground. Overhead hung two monstrosities that held full size mattress. This was the bedroom shared by two close friends. The friends sat quietly in a room that smelled of stale beer and cigarettes watching re-runs of "The Simpson's" or whatever else was on during the commercials.

It was the beginning of a new year. The outside was cold and school had just begun. It was early January and both friends had a full load of classes on their plate. Mason, was from Memphis, Tennessee. He was a scraggly boy but with quite a funny and playful side. Bill hailed from Cincinnati, Ohio. He was a serious type, somewhat carefree, but yet very logical. Bill and Mason both were in their Junior year of college. They attended the University of Tennessee. Many a days were spent talking and sharing stories of their hometowns, and high school heydays. It just so happened that today the droning television, which played nothing but re-runs from 4pm to 8pm, despite having 200+ channels, led to a conversation and story that would forever change Bill and Mason. This story would be later reminisced some four years later at Mason's wedding, but let's not get ahead of ourselves too quickly.

Mason says to Bill, "I think I want to start working out and getting into shape"

"Well you know I have a few theories about lifting weights and training, I used to be in great shape back in high school", said Bill.

"Oh yeah what do you know?" says Mason

"Well as I am sure you remember from our day after the Christmas party pledge versus brothers football game, I used to be quite the football player." boasts Bill.

"Yeah I remember you and Pittsburgh (the other northern in the freshman pledge class), were decked out in your high school football regalia and cleats to play a bunch of hung over older fraternity brothers," sneers Mason.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, any ways I took strength and conditioning class every year of high school and my teacher and coach taught me everything he knew. He would train us 3 times a week, we would do full body workouts and focus on all the muscle groups each workout. His philosophy, which I believe in, was to train to failure, recover, and do it again. This allows the muscles to get the little micro tears and re-build and become stronger. It works too! I really bulked up in high school under this doctrine of his. If you wanna start working out we should train together. I'll do it with you. It's always better to have a partner that way you push each other harder, and they can always be there to help you to get one more rep when you think you're spent."Says Bill.

"Really? That some good stuff." Mason says as he and Bill both simultaneously reach to stamp out there cigarettes in an already over flowing ash tray. "Maybe we should do it today, instead of sitting here flipping back and forth between Home Improvement re-runs and Inside Edition",

"Okay. I think I can put us both thru a solid workout. I did our workouts enough in high school I could never forget them. Plus I have never even been in that huge new T-REC's center across the street from our house. I mean its huge, brand new and I have never used it, chimed Bill.

Well alright then, lets get changed and go have at, a jovial Mason comments.

Mason and Bill rise up and start sifting threw their dirty clothes and dresser draws looking for clothes to wear while they workout. Obviously they didn't have a drawer set aside for workout clothes as this was something that was hardly a routine for either of them. They both would piece meal together some nylon shorts, cotton socks, and an old fraternity shirt, hoping they wouldn't look too out of place in the new fancy gym. The walk was short to the T-REC's or student recreation center at the University of Tennessee. It was literally across the street from the Fraternity house. A proverbial stones throw, but seriously, it could be hit it with a rock, and actually one night the previous summer one of the fraternity brother did just that. Minus the stone and add a beer bottle.

No one would ever suspect that these young college chaps, Mason 21 years and Bill only 20 would be turning a page in their live at this point. One could imagine and wonder what if these guys never decided to be roommates? What if one of them had scheduled a class during the time of "Home Improvement" re-runs and they would have never had that conversation? What if? There are so many other things that could have happened. But what happened that day would forever change Mason and Bill.

Becoming an Ironman

2009-05-22T09:53:00.002-05:00

So this week is a large week of training for me. I haven't wrote in a while, because simply I haven't had much on my mind. I have just been focusing on training and completing the workouts given to me. However yesterday while running on a 10.5 mile run and thinking about the workouts I have done so far and the ones ahead, I had an epiphany. I really am becoming an Ironman. I mean right now my easy workouts are between 2700 - 3000m in the pool, a 40 - 50 mile bike ride, and anywhere between 7 - 13 mile runs. These are easy to me and I feel fine after doing them. That is what is interesting is that I have built up such a base in training that I can go and do these workouts before and after work, and not skip a beat. I do them day after day too. In the past I remember a good afterwork bike ride would 25 miles. Now I comfortably will ride 40+ after work. Same with running, when I used to do 3 miles as a run, now its 7 - 13 miles. I know it's only a matter of time before I am saying that 70 - 80 mile rides are a walk in the park as well as 15 - 18 mile runs. It is truly amazing what the human body can do.

This weekend I have a hard workout. 3 hours of riding, with an hour of hill repeats followed by 2 hours of running. I am not gonna lie. I am a little intimidated by this workout. It might be as hard or harder than a Half Ironman. Next weekend, 4 hours of riding with over an hour of hill repeats and 2.5 hours of running. This WILL be the hardest workout I have ever done. That is the point of the training though. To push myself to new extremes, so that I can get comfortable with these 6.5 - 8 hour workouts. We shall see how this weekend and next week goes. Other than that, I feel if I get thru these workouts this weekend and next, that I am really going to be ready for IM Wisconsin and I still have some 113 days to go too! These workouts will be a big confidence booster for me.

Flat Tire and Volunteers

2009-04-20T21:22:00.004-05:00

So, my ankle has been acting up and the funny thing is that I didn't even do anything to hurt it. I was taking my boots off to change before my metabolic testing and all of sudden.... Its just really sore and hurt. So I stumbled thru last week with a "FLAT Tire" of a leg not running on it, icing and elevating, and only riding, swimming, and yoga. Well my analysis from last week is that the riding is not helping it. This is very unfortunate, because it limits my training. I get really upset when I can't ride, run, and jealous every time I see others riding or running. However I just need to stop and think about the big picture. Rest and let the leg heal for a few weeks worse case and then I can go on and continue to train. There is never any sense of pushing thru minor injuries because they almost inevitably get worse. I learned this a few years ago when I was training for my first half marathon. I will never make this mistake again. So I am reaching out to a Doctor my coach recommended and just take this bull by the horns and make the ankle better. I hope a few days off from riding and running will make it better. For now lots of ICE, YOGA, SWIMMING, AND NSAIDS..... Boo no cycling. I hope its better before the shiner bike ride too. I paid good money for that ride and am going and doing it in 2 weeks.

In other news I want to shout out to all my family who will be coming up to Wisconsin for my Ironman to go and sign up for volunteering at the race. Please follow the below link to do so. You can't sign up yet but they will ask for your email to get an alert when you can sign up. I would recommend for the following people to do these things:

Volunteer LINK

Dad, Jeff & Donnie -- Men's Transition Change Tent or Bike catchers
Mom and Sisters -- Bike Catchers, Wet Suit Strippers, Aid Station on the Run Course, or Bag hander outer before the change tent.

So here is the math on when and where I will be on the course throughout the day, here is a worst case scenario. So take this into consideration and make sure you would be volunteering before the below times but no later than the below times. e.g. bike catcher choose a time slot around 1pm -- 4pm. You will for sure catch me.

Swim Start : 7am

Swim Duration: 1:30

Wet Suit stripping (I'll be there before) : 8:30am

Bag Hander outer before the change tent before: 8:33am

Men's Transition Change Tent before: 8:34am

Bike Duration-- 7:00

Bike catcher (time you could catch my bike before) : 3:34pm

Men's Transition #2 before : 3:35pm

Run Aid Stations: anytime from 3:35pm to 6pm This will allow you to be at the finish line when I cross. Best case is I finish in like 11 hours so 7am -- 6pm. But the run is a 2 loop course so even if you aren't volunteering you will see me quite a few times too, and when I'm at mile 20 or so you can go to the finish line. I most likely will be able to also tell all of you my Pace per mile for the last 6 miles to figure out if you have enough time to get to the finish.

Lonestar Half Ironman Results

2009-04-08T12:29:00.015-05:00

Orville and Wilbur Wright are most commonly credited with inventing and building the worlds first successful airplane. If my memory serves me correct these brothers took much of their insight from nature around them. Inspired by the flight of birds these brothers did what many others had failed to do before them. They built a flying machine. There was no doubt times they doubted themselves during the course of their project. However persistance and a dream to someday build a flying machine came true that faithful day in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina.

One might wonder where is this post going, why allude to the Wright brothers. The point of this is to set the tone for this passage. These two individuals took on a seemingly insurmountable task of mastering flight, and achieved what no others had done successfully before them. Stop and think for a second about the feeling that both Orville and Wilbur felt when that plane moved forward through the air. A feeling of elation, achievement, and empowerment, must have enveloped the brothers like a swarm of bees to a comb of honey. The initial thought is that anything is possible.

Anything is possible, is exactly the phase that could carry thru to my feelings today as I write this. I wish to share my experience in my fourth half Ironman race in Glaveston, Texas this past weekend. I went into the weekend not really caring about the outcome. All that I wanted to gain from the race was good experience and regardless of the outcome I knew this would happen. I also wanted to use the race as a gauge to see where I am at physically and mentally. I was very pleased with my performance physically, but what pleased me more was my performance mentally. I had done something I have never done before during the race. Despite horrible pain and being on the verge of cramping with every step I took, I pushed my limits.

The swim was a 1.2 mile open water swim in a saltwater bay. This was an easy swim and it didn't phase me much. I completed the swim in 33:51 which works out to be a 1:45 / 100m. I didn't get in a groove until about 10 minutes into the swim. My only concern after the swim was the fact that I cut my toe on an oyster during warmup and knew I would have this to contend with the rest of the day. I had a slow transition of 2:31 but was ready to ride. I got on the bike and immediatly took my first gel. I hadn't ate since 5am and by this point it was 9am. I then started my watch timer for 15 minutes to make sure I would eat something 4 times per hour. I ended up consuming on the bike the following items:

3 - gel packs
1 - powerbar
1 - cliff bar
2 - packages of shot blocks
150 oz of water and gatorade combined
10 - endurolyte pills

My nutrition and electrolyte plan were solid. I think I am starting to get the hang of Half Ironman (HIM) distance racing. My only complaint about the bike is that I still don't believe I am used to riding a Tri specific bike. My quads were real sore towards the end of the bike and even more on the run. I am going to work with the store I bought the bike and my coach about its fit and why this is happening. This is the second time for that to happen. Anyways my bike split was 2:29:20 for 56 miles this works out to be an average of 22.5mph. This was followed by a quick 1:24 transition and off to the run. I was wearing my Zoot shoes without socks and finsihed my first of 4 laps on the run and looked down and my shoe was covered in blood. I figured I better stop at my coaches tent and put on the socks I had them holding for me. The sitting and putting on my socks caused me to start to cramp. This sucked. I stopped and rubbed out my quads and it helped. I had to keep pushing because I knew deep inside I had the time to break 5 hours but I didn't have anytime to spare. With the first 2 laps done it became a numbers game. My quads were on fire and with that my hamstrings were close to follow. I kept pushing. I started playing mental games and singing the refrain from a song by Lynard Skynard called "All I Can Do Is Write About It" as shown below. I also started singing "Traveling Riverside Blues" by Robert Johnson but performed by Led Zeppelin also shown below. When I say singing I mean like almost screaming loud. Its weird on a race course because you are very close to alot of other people but no one is talking. So I am sure people may have been annyoed but I just wanted to distract myslef from the pain I was experiencing.

So I made it to the final of the 4 laps and looked at my watch and realized I needed to run the last 3.1 miles in about 24 minutes or less to break 5 hours. This I knew I could do, but it was going to hurt. So I ran the first 2 miles and realized I had less than 8 minutes to run the last mile. This is when I just pushed it into another gear and starting running fast. I was able to run the last mile in 7:37. I amazed even myself with this time. I went to another place in my brain and shut off all pain I was feeling and focused solely on the finish line. As you will see from one of the below pictures I had to push past another competitor who was walking in order to make my times. I crossed the finish line and my watch indicated I had finished in 4:59:57. 3 seconds to spare. My surge at the end caught the attention of another runner and spurred him to pick up the pace and finish strong as well. He was very appreciative when in the last stretches I encouraged him to run with me and finish strong. We chatted after the race breifly and this was his first HIM and he had just broke 5 hours. This is an amazing feat for any triathlete of any age. He was 45 years old too. I high tailed it to the medical tent so they could mend my bloody toe and horrible blisters. I also convinced them to give me an IV while I sat there. I love IV's I wish I could have an IV after all of my weekend training runs and rides. They are amazing. They do in 45 minutes what drinking water for 8hrs does. Amazing simply amazing.

With all of that being said I was super excited with my performance and achieved something I used to think was going to be impossible. The most important learning experience from this race is that even when it hurts so bad, and you think you are going to cramp and cripple over, your mind can achieve what your body cannot. My mind took me to the finish line not my legs.

The final results are as follows:

Swim 1.2 miles : 33:51 -- 1:45 / 100m

Transition #1 : 2:31

Bike 56 miles: 2:29:20 -- 22.5mph AVG

Transition #2: 1:24

Run 13.1 miles: 1:52:45 -- 8:36 / mile

Total Time: 4:59:54

I got 11th place in the 25 - 29 year old age group out of 43 people. I placed 78th out of 609 people.

Is there room for improvement? Absolutly. I think I can get my bike average close to 25mph and my run time down to around 1:40 or about 7:45 - 8:00 minutes per mile.

All in all the race was a success.

Here are some pictures.

Lonestar Half Ironman

2009-04-03T06:18:00.002-05:00

Greetings from Dallas, tonight I will go to bed in Houston as I prepare for the Lonestar Half Ironman. I just wanted to give an update to anyway who is interested and or really board on Sunday. I will be racing in the Lonestar Half Ironman and it will actually be broadcast on the internet. Follow the below link and you can watch coverage.

My Race Number is 244, I am in swim wave #3 and will be wearing a green swim cap. For the race I will have on a tank top style shirt and will have a blue and silver bike with pink water bottle holders on the back. On the run I will be wearing a visor. Let me know if you watch!!!

http://www.lonestartri.com/lonestar/video.html

Ironman St. George, Utah

2009-03-26T05:44:00.013-05:00

Well I pulled the trigger. Last week on Wednesday I received an email from Active.com like I always get and it was announcing to me to that the WTC had just added another North American Ironman race. The race will be held in St. George, Utah on May 1, 2010. Seeing this email and reading it blew me away. I then continued to scroll down and realized that they currently had open registration for this race. I started to get excited. I thought to myself that I could register for an Ironman race, the inaugural race at that, without out having to travel to the race site on race weekend. I thought to myself that this was a once in a life time shot. So I pulled the trigger.

It is official I have signed up for my second Ironman distance race before I have even completed my first. It should prove to be a picturesque race too. I will post some pictures from the website. The icing on the cake is 2 friends of mine also signed up for the race as well. What makes this even better is that all 3 of us are looking to rent a house in St. George too. Check out the link for the house we may rent. Houses.

After some thought and deliberation, I have decided that in 2010 I plan to go on a long bike ride. I have been speaking with a friend of the family from Cincinnati, my hometown, about how to prepare for such a trip. My initial thoughts are Tacoma, Washington to Dallas, Texas. I would carry everything I would need on my bike and make the trek in 2 - 3 weeks. I figure I would have to cover around 100 - 200 miles per day on the bike in order to complete the ride. I would camp as often as possible, and take as many pictures as possible. I feel like this would be a once in a lifetime opportunity and something I need to do while still young, without a family and many more commitments.

In other news I celebrated my birthday on Sunday and turned 25 years young. Its crazy but time really flies when you get out of college. Just thought I would update everyone with these new happenings. I will be traveling to Galveston this weekend to race in my 4 Half Ironman Distance race. I really won't be racing but using this race as an experience builder and heavy training day. Lets hope for safe travels and good weather. I have a few friends going down too as well as my coach. I am pumped about a good weekend. I am taking work off Monday to recover and travel back to Dallas. Then the office is closed on Friday for good Friday so that is going to be a short week for me. I hope to get in an easy recovery ride and or swim next weekend too.

I will leave you with a quote from a birthday card my little sister sent. It is really inspiring and is true to the way I live my life. I have to say it is one of the first cards that I have ever gotten that is meaningful to me. For that Thanks Brooke!!!

Dreams are power, they are imagination shaping our lives from the inside, they are possibilities becoming reality before our eyes; believe in the power of your dreams, and go achieve your dreams!

What am I up to???

2009-03-17T10:32:00.003-05:00

So my last post resulted in a few email replies. Which by the way I enjoy greatly. Some of the replies where about what I am doing these days. I feel that this blog is a great way to communicate to a vast audience of friends and family. So I thought I would post this week about what I am doing right now in my life.

Right now I am currently employed by Turner Construction company. I work in a purchasing role as well as field coordination role. Its a really dynamic job and I am always trying to stay one step ahead of problems so I can do less reacting to issues as they come my way. Needless to say, I enjoy it and especially like the hours and limited travel. This allows me to focus on things I really enjoy like triathlons, cooking, yoga, running, reading, and travel.

I am currently reading "Into the Wild" by Jon Krakauer. I think I am really going to enjoy this book, and already makes me want to go on a long trip across America, solo, on my bicycle. Maybe just ride a few thousand miles from east to west coast??? I just finished reading "My Life on the Run" by Bart Yasso. I really liked this book.

Other than that I hang out with friends, cook, and sit by the pool. Just this past Sunday I made homemade pizza. Completely from scratch. I made the dough, with yeast and everything, then let rise and pounded it out and cooked it. A laborious task but fun. It was really good too. The dough was really tasty, way better than most restaurants. What did I learn from it, use less dough, because it was too thick of crust.

Now on to what really takes up my time, training for my Ironman. I will post a week of my schedule for next week 3/23/09 thru 3/29

Monday
90 minutes of Hot Yoga

Tuesday
75 minutes of running with a HR of 151 - 159
90 minutes of strength training

Wednesday
120 minutes of cycling with a HR of 127 - 157
60 minutes of hot yoga

Thursday
90 minutes of running with a HR of 151 - 159

Friday
90 minutes of strength training

Saturday
120 minutes of cycling with a HR of 127 - 157 immediately followed by a BRICK RUN of 70 minutes at a HR of 159+

Sunday
REST

This will be a really solid week. And mixed in to that week I am taking a day trip to New Orleans to go tour a factory. I have never been to New Orleans before and am very much looking forward to running around the city for 90 minutes on Thursday evening. This is a great way to see the city too. I can in 90 minutes see probably almost every site I would need to. I'll run well over 10 miles in that amount of time.

This is pretty much what most of my weeks are like. Train hard, take it easy on Sunday, and work hard.

So it is a simple life but enjoyable. I really have minimal concerns for anything. The only way I get upset is if its raining or cold out. This puts a wrench in my cycling plans. Like I said before I love the email replies and comments. So keep em coming.

Cheers!!!!

Marathon #2

2009-03-06T08:32:00.000-06:00

We all have them, we all remember them. They are the memories of experiences in our lifetime for which we have never experienced before, or as I will call them your “Firsts”. They may be your first date with your wife, your first love, your first job; your first day of school, your first day of driving, and the list goes on forever. What’s significant about each of them is that you never forget them. They are special and important, to each one of us; sometimes good and sometimes even bad. When a “First” is experienced with others close to you; each individual takes away something different from that experience. Let’s not look at a first, but compare a second to a first.

On Sunday February 15, 2009 I embarked on running my second marathon. I signed up for this marathon to keep myself busy before I began my training for the Ironman. I followed a slow build up of long runs from 13 miles all they way to a 22.5 mile long run. I did this from the middle of November to the last week in January, with a two week taper. I limited my running to 3 times per week. After all the training was completed, I felt like I had a really solid base and would be very successful in my marathon.

The big difference between the first and second marathon was the fact that prior to this race, I was completely ambivalent and didn’t have any worries. Last year I was really quite nervous and had a great deal of mixed emotions. I was really excited about running in the marathon and this year not as much. What I was excited about was how my experience would be different from last year. How would a year of endurance sport training help me on the course? How would being a year older and wiser help me? Would these things boil down to a better time or more enjoyable experience? This is what I wanted to find out. What I noticed during my training the most was that I recovered from my long runs much more quickly. This is very interesting to see how the body can adapt and replenish itself. I was hoping for the same outcome at the marathon.

I was fortunate to schedule a meeting on Friday morning in Austin with one of our projects. It just so happened that I scheduled this meeting the same weekend as the marathon, wink, wink. Scheduling these meetings this way allowed me to have my company pay for my flight to Austin. The day was a good day and checked into the hotel in the early afternoon and just kicked up my feet and relaxed. When Saturday rolled around we did absolutely nothing but eat lunch go to Lance Armstrong’s new bike shop, and relax. Come Sunday morning I arose early and went thru my normal routine. It would be a warm day so shorts and a t-shirt would be all I wore.

I started off running with the 8:23 per mile pace group or the 3:40 marathon pace group. It was nice to see that the pacers were the same folks from last year. Last year I tried to run a 3:40 marathon but ended up hitting the wall and ran a 3:44. This year I wasn’t concerned with the time but more with having a solid race. With no pomp and circumstance, the gun went off and we waited for our usual 3 or 4 minutes till we could actual run. Just like that the race began. The miles ticked away, one after another. It was a good group of pacers. The woman pacer had a kazoo and kept blowing it chanting: “Austin to Boston…. The 3:40 train is coming thru”. The reason for that quote was for is that for women ages 18 – 34 the qualifying time for the Boston Marathon is 3:40. We had a good time running the miles and chatting. I recall at one point in the race saying to myself, “Are we really already at mile 17? It feels like we just started.” I guess having these thoughts or comments are a good thing, and that I am getting really comfortable with running long distances. The miles continued to pass by. An interesting thing about the race was an individual named Ryan, who was signed up for the half marathon decided to run the full marathon on a whim. He kept running with us at mile 11 instead of breaking off and finish with the rest of the Half Marathon participants. Ryan was a Marine and was now in flight school down in south Texas. All I have to say about that is he is pretty hard core, to be running a 8:23 pace for almost 26 miles without even training for it. Needless to say the course would get the best of both Ryan and me around mile 24. Right at mile 24 is where I broke off from the pace group, it was interesting because a few others did as well. I felt on the verge of a few cramps and even a little light headed. At this point the heat of the day was beginning to play a factor and if I would be out on the course any longer it would have been adverse. So I decided to walk for 30 or 40 seconds then run for a couple minutes. Both Ryan and I would finish the race together. I congratulated him and went and promptly found my pacers and thanked them. I ended up finishing in 3:43:34. I was quite pleased with this performance. My pace per mile was 8:31.

After finishing the race I wasn’t as elated as I was after my first one, but a different feeling set in, a feeling of continued accomplishment. I felt that day and for the few days after, that I was really a runner. I felt like a real runner and an accomplished runner at that. I had completed my second marathon. I knew at that moment, I would run many more of them and they would only get easier each time. The lady that helped pace me thru the race had completed 35 marathons. I stopped and thought for a second, that I hope someday I can say the same thing. I figure if I run 2 or 3 a year by the time I’m 40, I could feasibly have ran over 45 marathons. That’s pretty damn impressive, and that’s just by the time I’m 40. I am sure I will be running well into my later years too. That’s what this race meant to me, it was a continuing of my endurance sport career. It was continued accomplishment.

In other news coming off the heels of this race I felt the urge to do another marathon. So I acted, and signed up this week for the Chicago Marathon. I will be running the Chicago Marathon on October 11, 2009. This is one month after my Ironman. My thoughts are that I really won’t even have to train for it either. Just a bit of recovery and some 18 milers and I will be ready to go. So often we take for granted things we do everyday, let us stop for one second and while doing something, try to stop and remember the first time you did it and see if you can remember it or compare it. Chances are that it may evoke some interesting memories. Cheers!

Brett

A Letter to Team in Training

2009-02-09T12:22:00.003-06:00

The below is a letter I wrote for my coach to share with all of the new Team in Training members that he will be coaching this season here in the North Dallas Chapter of Team in Training.

NO PAIN NO GAIN!!! We've all heard that statment before right? Well its not true at all, and let me tell you why. As you sit here today wondering what you got yourself into and how you are going to complete a triathlon in a few short months of training. Well its pretty simple. Your going to put one foot in front of the other and keep your eyes glued on your heart rate monitor. I have been a runner for over 3 years. I only recently started training with a Heart rate monitor in about August of 2008. I knew the principles behind HR training but never really had a desire to put them to practice. Until I would begin my Ironman training. I wish I wouldn't have waited. Up until November I was purely using the heart rate monitor (HRM) and recording my data on all my workouts. I knew at the time I was not utilizing the HRM to its full potential. But the data I was recording would be my future measuring stick and my pot of gold at the end of the rainbow if you will to gauge all of my success'.

Currently Todd Codish is my coach for my first Ironman distance race. As Todd has already explained to you he believes in HR training, and wants you all to believe in it too. Well I am here to tell you my story and why you should believe. Before my training for my Ironman began, I went to have a metabolic test completed with Todd. The purpose of this was to give me 4 HR zones in which I would train to achieve my goals of completeing an Ironman. This test was completed in November, from this testing I walked away with my new HR zones to train with. I would take these heart rate zones and apply them to the marathon training I would be doing over the next 4 months. I am currently about to run in my 2nd Marathon and have spent the past 4 months training solely by heart rate. You may ask yourself what does this mean? Well to keep it simple, you are training your body to use fat as the main source of fuel for excercise, since in all of us there is an endless supply of fat. I would begin to teach my body how to better utilize its fat storage in lieu of the carb or glucose storage. I have been teaching my body to use fat as its fuel by running all of my training runs for this marathon with a HR between 150 - 160. I never let my heart rate go over 160 BPM. No matter how good I feel at that time, or how fast I want to go, sometimes this means I have to stop and walk.

From this day forward if you want to be a successful endurance athlete, quit worrying about your average speed on the bike or your pace per mile on the run and start focusing on your heart rate. Before begining my training with my HRM, I knew the basic priciniple of what was supposed to happen, that is my pace per mile would go down while my heart rate stayed the same. This is in essence your efficiency rating. Well I am here today to say I am really amazed by the results. In the first 2 months there were many days where I felt like I could go much faster and in the past I would have picked up the pace, but I stuck to Todd's plan. Like he always says, know the plan -- work the plan. I also didn't mind that I didn't really have to push myself anymore either. There was less pounding on my body too. For example I would be on a 15 miler and felt great at like mile 7 and wanted to pick up the pace but instead my HR was saying no, I would be forced to walk and let my HR come down below 160 bpm. This is tough to do but its worth it. On a few runs my pace was in the 9:00 per mile, but my average heart rate was below 160. With time, my pace per mile began to drop, and my HR stayed the same. This got me excited. The results speak for themselves. A week ago I ran 10 miles with an average heart rate of 150 bpm at a pace of 7:36 per mile. My normal easy runs of 5 - 8 miles I started out running at a 9 min mile pace to keep my HR below 160, and now after 4 months I am amazed to say my runs of 5 - 8 miles are in the 7:30 - 7:45 / mile pace with an average heart rate that is never above 160 and most of the time around an avg of 150.

So to make a long story short, I taught my body how to become more efficient. What does this mean and what did this do for me? Well when I get off that bike after 112 miles in the Wisconsin Dairyland, my body will not have to work nearly as hard to hold an 8:45 pace for 26.2, in fact it may even feel pretty easy after doing my heart rate training for some 9 months.

All I have to say to each and everyone of you is good luck, listen to Todd, he knows what he is talking about and will take you to the finish line and be there waiting for you too.

Another notch in the belt

2009-01-19T21:04:00.003-06:00

Our country and the world are undergoing immense change and there is much uncertainty about the future ahead. While it may seem naive and stupid to say, to me nothing has changed. I am still employed. I have a great family and friends. I work with good people who want to make a difference. Despite the aura of uncertainty in the US economic market and world market my life has been static. There are times, now, and in the past where things don't always go as you would like but due to the family, friends, and my job all is okay. To many right now one of the legs of that tripod of life is missing. I am fortunate that my tripod is still standing. Without all of those people involved in my life I would not have been able to achieve all that I have today. My colleague's at work are understanding of my training, my family and friends are always supportive. What I am getting at is that I am creating my Triathlon Team. All of these people are on my team, and I am always open to accepting anyone else who wants to be on my team.

I read another blog post (Click Here) of a person who I read weekly Gordon Byrn and it made me realize that despite triathlon being an individual sport, where only your legs, arms, and heart can get you to the finish line, if it wasn't for the support from all those around you, your goals would could possibly not be attained. I appreciate the support I get from all of my family, co-workers and friends. I am happy to have this blog as an outlet to tell everyone this. Thanks.

So lets get 2009 started. My first week of training went well. I am pleased with the format and looking forward to many more weekends. I also just signed up for another Half Ironman race. It is April 5th in Galveston, Texas. Its call the Lonestar Half Ironman. I did this race last year too. It was my first Half Ironman race.This race is important to me because I am a big believer in local economies and buying local when possible, etc. etc. Recently as you know Galveston was hit by a devastating hurricane. Hurricane Ike was a brutal storm to Texas. The local economy and business were decimated. A triathlon was scheduled before the hurricane and is still on despite the damage. Its important because of the economic impact it will have in Galveston. There will be close to some 2000 plus people traveling to the area, dining, and using lodging. Myself included. This will be a much needed revenue boost for the economy and a positive thing for Galveston. I am glad to be a part of it.

So I will continue to train for Wisconsin and simply use this race as fun training day!!!

Its time to go fast

2009-01-13T21:56:00.004-06:00

Well its done. I bought my new bike. I got a 2009 Cervelo P2C, with ultegra groupo on it. Pretty pleased. I rode both that bike and the specialized transition comp and as soon as I got off the transition and onto the P2C I knew the P2 was for me. I also bought all the goodies too:

Aero Tail Drink holders
Bottle Cages
New Aero Helmet
New Pedals
An Extra Cassette for my Race Wheels
Soon to be buying the 2009 Flash Point FP60's
New wireless computer for my bike
New bike pump because my old one broke
New lenses for my riding glasses because I horribly scratched but protected myself on my existing pair.

In other news I began my first week of IRONMAN (IM) training with my coach. I am currently training for the Austin Marathon on 2/15/09. This will be my second marathon. My IM coach has incorporated this into the beginning weeks of my training. My coaches name is Todd Codish. See his bio. He is a good friend and awesome coach to work with. I have known him for a year and had the opportunity to work with him during my first Half Ironman with Team In Training. I believe the science behind his coaching methods and believe in him 100% . I know he will take me to the finish line in Madison. Without him and his help, I would be learning more from all of my mistakes along the way instead of letting him teach me from his vast wisdom and experience. He will give me weekly workouts and I give him weekly feed back after I complete the workouts and ask questions anytime I need to and he helps out a great deal. So from time to time over the next 9 months or so I guess I'll upload my training schedule so people can check it out. I need to figure out the best way to post an excel spreadsheet too??? Any suggestions please reply or comment. I am really excited about the next 9 months, but for right now I really only have 2 more long runs left before the marathon. I have an 18 miler this weekend then a 21 miler next and after that my taper begins. I am starting to get excited for my marathon. I can't wait to experience it again. After training for this race a second time it has really started to grow on me and I have enjoyed it more this year than last. I think going forward I will do at least one marathon a year if not multiple. Anyways here we go on the beginning of a new year and a new year of goals to met.

Now for some pictures of the bike:

The story book of life.....

2009-01-11T01:55:00.004-06:00

Our lives unfold before us like a map in our lap on a long road trip. Always turning, rotating, and every guessing which way is NORTH. It is this endless questioning that keeps us afloat in this turbulent sea that is life. We all know someone in our life that has had an impact upon where we are today. Whether these people are friends, teachers, or co-workers. We all unknowingly impact each others lives every day. Sometimes we impact or have a certain effect on another that may go unnoticed by the one that it is actually affecting. Feelings for others may ebb and flow as the tides of the pacific ocean. But what is important is that unlike the sand that is washed away by the crashing waves, that we as friends and family let the truth of our hearts and minds be known to those that matter. Where this is all going is that it is important to speak your feelings and let them be known.

SHIT HAPPENS!!!!!

I just felt like saying that, because its true. Life is short and its important to be honest to ourselves first and foremost, but also honest to all those around you. Speak your mind and don't be scarred. If you are as weird as me, then you probably talk to yourself on a regular basis. Its time to quit talking out loud and begin to start speaking to other. The worst that can happen is that you scare others around you and whats the harm in that??? Living your life to the fullest means you don't always get what you want. because the best part of life is overcoming or experiencing something that you can not replicate.

Upon closing this post, its time we all examine where we are at and where we are going. Take a deep look and make sure its what you want!!!!!

Parting Ways

2008-12-19T19:07:00.006-06:00

So it wasn't too long ago that I moved to Texas. I moved here on a sultry summer day in August of 2007. I had a whole two weeks off of work before I began the rest of my adult life. These two weeks were very interesting. Moving to a new city is always a challenge, especially when you don't know anyone. I mean anyone. The only person I knew was my ex-girlfriend, who was part of the reason why I moved here. Needless to say we were exactly dating when I moved here, but that is besides the point. I made a decision as an adult and decided to stick with it and see where it took me. Making this decision was easy at first. However after I broke up with my girlfriend, I can't say that I didn't question the decision I had made.

Overwhelming, small, unknown, and intense are the words that come to mind when I think about the first few weeks here in Dallas. I was a 23 year kid/man living for the first time in a city where I knew no one. I went to college in a different city, but prior to moving I knew a few people. When I moved to Dallas, I knew no one. I moved to this city with nothing more than the clothes in my closet, my bike, my running shoes, and my goggles. I had no furniture, bed, or anything what so ever. I was busy the first few weeks, fitting out my bedroom, living room, and kitchen with all the appropriate accouterments that a 23 year should have living in a big city. I for once was able to make things the way I wanted them.

Every day I rose and had tons of stuff to do. I always managed to squeeze in a run, swim, or a bike ride at some point. Despite the many tasks I even had time to sit by the pool every day too, have a beer or 2 or 10. This is where I first met some great people. One hot Saturday afternoon, after running in the morning obviously, I was sitting poolside with a beer and a book. Oh just saying that makes me want to be on vacation. Poolside with a beer and a book, say it with me: "Beer and a Book". Back to the story. I am very skeptical person and can sometimes judge too quickly. As I am reading, I hear the all too familiar gate crashing and latch catching. This noise was synonymous with a new guest in the pool area. My eyes peak up from my Jimmy Buffett novel and I peer through my dark sunglasses at 3 lovely young ladies with a cooler and a Jam Box. They looked ready to party. I thought to myself, what do we have here.

When you move to a big a city where you don't know anyone, you can't be shy or reclusive. You just have to throw it all out there and see what happens. These 3 girls obviously saw me as well. They promptly asked me if I wanted to play drinking games with them. I am sure I responded with something along the lines "Does the Pope wear a white hat?"

The lab relay race / chugging contest drinking games gave way to the beginning of a wonderful friendship with Audrey, Yvette, and Andrea They would soon become my closest friends in Dallas. Audrey and Yvette lived together and Andrea lived with her fiance Mike. Whenever I didn't have anything to do I would call those girls and see what they were up too. I viewed them as such good friends I even flew to California for Andrea and Mike's wedding. I soon met all of their friends from college and everyone was always so welcoming and friendly. So many times when you meet new people they can be arrogant and not friendly. These folks weren't like that at all. Audrey and all of her friends soon made Dallas feel like a small place.

I soon grew a real close relationship with Audrey and Yvette. They were almost always together. We all shared stories about our past and were around for each other through some important points in each others lives. I won't share some of the things that happened in these girls lives but I will share some of my stories. For me one of the most meaningful things that Audrey and Yvette did for me was to come with me to Austin, Texas when I ran my first marathon. For anyone who reads this blog, you know I run a bunch and do triathlons. Anyways, I told these girls about it and they organized and group and next thing you know we were leaving town on Friday afternoon.

The entire trip was a blast. I achieved that day something I used to think was never possible. I ran 26.2 miles. It was the biggest accomplishment of my life at that point. I was ecstatic to have some close friends cheering me on at mile 20 of the race and then waiting for me at the finish line. It is really something special when you know people are waiting for you at the finish line of a long race. Its motivation to finish. It was really special for me to have someone else to share this moment with. I have done so many races where I am alone in a different city and I feel great for finishing and all the hard work pays off, but its different when you can share it with close friends who have seen the effort you put forth.

No matter how long I continue to run, or do triathlons, I will always remember finishing my first marathon. I will never forget the weekend that surrounded that race and the long car ride home, in which Audrey drove my car because I couldn't move my legs.

I write this post with great despondency, for as of last weekend Audrey has moved back to her home to go back to school. Its great for her to be going back to school to pursue a passion of hers, but its sad to see one of my closest friends leave. I will never forget Audrey. We shared many great times together. She will always have a special place in my life and I hope that I get to see her again soon.

Cheers Audrey, I'll miss seeing you!

A smoking gun

2008-12-13T11:46:00.007-06:00

Cigarettes

cigarette (French "small cigar", from cigar + -ette) is a product consumed through smoking and manufactured out of cured and finely cut tobacco leaves and reconstituted tobacco, often combined with other additives,[1] then rolled or stuffed into a paper-wrapped cylinder (generally less than 120 mm in length and 10 mm in diameter). The cigarette is ignited at one end and allowed to smoulder for the purpose of inhalation of its smoke from the other (usually filtered) end, which is inserted in the mouth.

That description, as taken from Wikipedia, is what I used to smoke. I smoked cigarettes. It may seem hard to imagine, but I did. I think I smoked a cigarette for the first time when I was in the 6th grade. I was busted smoking cigarettes with some folks at my Junior High when I was in the 7th grade. I smoked all thru high school and for 4 years in College. When I began to run to loose weight this running slowly turned into a hobby. The summer of 2006, I ran my first 5k race. It was a time of 24:24. I was very pleased. This race helped to spur me to all of the things I have done today and will do in the future. It was that summer that I really began to get serious with my running. I was to the point where I would run between 15 - 20 miles per week. I talked with a few people about running a half marathon and they encouraged me to do it. The individuals name Fernando Rodriguez a co-worker of mine at Turner Universal in Nashville, encouraged me to do so. He indicated that I was already running enough each week to be ready for one.

That summer I lived in an apartment with two of my Fraternity Brothers in Nashville. Every weekend we would go out party and drink at the bars. Every weekend I would end up buying a pack of cigarettes at the bar smoking them while I was drunk and waking up in the morning and feeling absolutely horrible. I couldn't breathe, smelled like smoke, and had horrible taste in my mouth. The thing was I wouldn't smoke at all during the week ever. It disgusted me to smell it, or touch them, but yet my drunkenness would take over at a bar and I would end up buying a pack smoking some and having the rest left over.

I was sick and tired of it. I decided one night sight on seen while in Chicago, visiting my friends from high school to quit smoking forever and dedicate myself to my running. This is when it happened. No more cigarettes for me from that point on.

When I look at major things that I have done that have impacted my life, quitting smoking was and is possibly the best thing I have ever done. Cigarettes are a horrible thing and do nothing for you but slowly kill you. I don't like to preach to others about not smoking, because it's their decision to smoke. I quit when I was ready and when I felt the need to quit. Ever since then my life has been better. It was easy to do, every time for like the next year I would be in a bar drinking, because that's the only time I ever wanted a cigarette was when I was drunk, I would simply remind myself that I was a runner (not yet a triathlete). How many people in the running community smoke cigarettes? ZERO, hopefully. If were to cave and smoke a cigarette, I would be a hypocrite, because of all the benefits that I got from running and preached about, would be washed away by the cigarette. So its been over 2 years since a cigarette has touched my lips, and not a day goes by where I don't think about how I am so happy that I quit smoking. Like I said before it was one of the best things I have ever done in my entire life.

The reason for this post was something recently happened here in Dallas that I am very ecstatic about. They Dallas City Council banned smoking in all bars and establishments. This is great, because it will not only help the health of all people, but many people won't be lured into smoking. I am so happy about the smoking ban and can't wait to go out to a bar and not smell like smoke when I come home.

Looking Back

2008-12-11T07:07:00.003-06:00

So today I was reviewing my splits from my PR half marathon race last year at the Dallas White Rock Half Marathon. I ran a personal best of 1:33:33. That equates to an average pace of 7:08 per mile. I however didn't run 7:08 per mile. I did what is called negative splitting. The first 5 miles were in 7:36 pace, after 8 mile marker my pace was at 7:19. Then for the next 5.1 miles I ran at a pace to get me to 7:08 per mile. This morning I had a tempo run on my schedule. I ran 5.5 miles at a 7:19 average pace. I again ran negative splits on this run. I had an average HR of 163 and a peak of 188. It is amazing what the body can do. Every race I have ever done and set a PR I have had negative splits. It can be hard to control yourself and not tear out of the starting blocks but once you have mastered this you can begin to set PR's. I still think my time for that half marathon is outstanding, and I probably won't be breaking it any time soon. Unless that is my goal for the season.

On another note, I attended my first Hot Yoga class on Tuesday evening and plan to attend another one tonight. It was invigorating. The classroom temperature is set to 98.6 degrees with 60% humidity. The class is 90 minutes long. I was drenched in sweat after the class. I like the class format a lot better than my Yoga DVD's too. Its not cheap but I think after the introductory period is up I will be a regular and sign up for the unlimited classes per month. It costs $109.00, but will be worth its weight in gold in terms of increasing my flexibility and heat acclimatization. One of my beliefs about flexibility is that it is AS important as the actual training. For example, you could have the strongest heart, legs, arms, but what good are they if you can move them through a full range of motion. If you are trying to race in endurance sports and can't touch your feet without bending your legs..... you should skip a workout and do some Yoga. In my honest opinion, running one less day and doing yoga will make you a better runner hands down. Have a good day everyone.

Post the results

2008-12-05T09:52:00.009-06:00

Okay so I tested last night and as I said I would post the results. My coach pushed me pretty hard. He said he was very impressed with my VO2 max on the bike because it was very high, however a high VO2 max does not necessarily mean that you an excellent athlete. Its all about becoming more efficient on how you burn fat and prolonging the time before you stop burning fat and start burning carbs. I pleased with the results and feel they will aid in my training greatly. Here is a great example why. This past Saturday I had a 15 mile run schedule. My goal was to go out and run the 15 miles and keep my heart rate in the steady state zone. If you look at the first picture you can see the interpretation of the data and my corresponding heart rate zones. The steady state is 151 - 159. My goal was to keep the HR between this zone. At one point in the run about 11 miles in I felt really strong and wanted to pick up the pace. I began to do so and my HR jumped. I had to slow down significantly to keep it below 159. What this is saying is that my Rate of Perceived Exertion doesn't correspond to what my actual fat usage is doing. I felt like I had plenty of gas in the tank, when in reality I really don't. This is what the scientific testing told my coaches and why they established my zones. The reason for keeping the HR below 159 is that past this point I begin to burn carbs and not fat. So on all of my long runs, I will now keep my HR below 159. Only on my tempo runs will I let it rise above that rate. Cool stuff.

The results are as shown in the pictures below:

Testing the limits

2008-12-04T12:57:00.002-06:00

Today is going to be a big day. This evening I will be meeting with my coach for my first Ironman race. His name is Todd Codish. He is a great guy to work with and an indispensable asset. I will be completing metabolic testing with him tonight. Metabolic testing is a testing procedure that will gauge how my body uses fat as a fuel for exercise. Even in elite and extremely lean athletes, fat is an almost unlimited supply of fuel. Not the case with carbohydrates, your body can only hold so much carbs. The goal of the testing is to find the rate and heart rate zones at which you are currently burning fat while cycling and running, in an effort to increase that rate of fat burn. If you can push the level and burn fat better, it will take you longer to BONK or run out of fuel. In an Ironman distance race you need to be able to last close to 12 hours of continuous vigorous exercise. This takes some science and practice. I am excited to see how the results turn out because I had this testing completed last February of 2008. So almost a year later, during that year I have accomplished many new PR's and pushed myself further than I ever had in the past. I suspect that once complete all of my data will exceed that of last year. If it doesn't, then that means my training methods of the past year were ineffective. Its important to establish this baseline as it will guide my coach Todd in creating an effective program that will prepare me for the Ironman Wisconsin. So here are some links to visit about metabolic testing. I will post the results from this year and last year for comparison when I get them. Wish me luck.

Metabolic Testing Site #1

Really good Site that describes the process

A time to be thankful

2008-11-24T22:10:00.003-06:00

Recently my Sundays have been filled with food, friends, women, and fun. In my opinion there are not many better ways to spend a Sunday. Sitting around having some cocktails, cooking an elaborate dinner and relishing in the moments of an all too fast weekend. The weekends come and they go. Before you realize it the summer is gone and the holiday season is here. Friends and family, the sometimes overwhelming but fun holiday season is upon us.

Regardless of whether you celebrate the holiday, its is always a good time to stop and think what we you have in life to be thankful for. I myself am thankful for the following things:

My family

My friends

My job

My ability to exercise

My health

My positive and optimistic outlook on life

My hobbies

So if you've read this far stop for a second and write down the things in your life that you are thankful to have been given, blessed with, worked for, or that have simply fallen into your lap by chance. To forget the things that you are thankful for is when you begin to overlook the people and things that are crucial to maintaining a healthy life balance.

So everyone never forget, someone out there is compiling a list of they are thankful for this holiday season, and one of the things on that list just might be your name. Be thankful for that, but never forget it either. We all rely on others for something in some form or fashion.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Short sweet and to the point

2008-11-11T05:13:00.002-06:00

Last night I just finished reading a book by Dean Karnazes entitled 50/50: Secrets I Learned Running 50 Marathons in 50 Days -- and How You Too Can Achieve Super Endurance! Towards the end of the book a quote jumped out at me and it really hit home. At times in life things can get busy. These days people more than ever are trying to fit 30 hours worth of stuff into a 24 hour day. It goes without saying that you will have to sacrifice something. Lets just hope that you choose the right thing to sacrifice.

For me, I woke up today at 5 and am about to head out for a 7 mile run. I am back training for my second marathon and it has gone great so far. Needless to say, I am really busy right now with work but no matter what I am still going to get my training and running in. Now at times that may be why I have no clean clothes, a sink full of dishes, a dirty toilet, and dust on every surface. It all comes down to priorities, and where things like exercise rank your life. For me its right at the top. So here is the quote:

"The past is the past, the future's uncertain, and today is a gift. That's why they call it the present."

--Dean Karnazes

So its all about priorities and deciding the important things in your life, don't get wrapped up in work, or school so much that you forget what is important to you.

You can't always get what you want.... But if you try sometimes.... You get what you need!

2008-10-27T19:52:00.002-05:00

As the classic Rolling Stones song so aptly describes, things do not always go your way, but if you try, you'll get it. As we move through our lives, many things are given and taken away from us. We all experience losses and gains, weather they be material, spiritual, or mental. As we grow old friends and family move away, money may come into our pockets in greater or lesser amounts. The bottom line is that life is full of ups and downs, gains and losses, and most of all learning and accepting new ideas that come with those gains and losses.

There has been a point in all of our lives in which we have been either forced by a peer, teacher, coach, or most of all a parent, to do something that we didn't want to do. The motive behind someone forcing you do something is not always clear. As said by a wise man, you can't always see a tree through the forest. When presented with new and foreign things its always easier to reject and not accept. The most difficult thing is to accept, learn, and become better. No one, no matter how motivating or encouraging, can make you get better at anything in life. It is evident through history that no one is more of a motivator for you than yourself. It's the minute that you decide to do something out of your own free will, for the betterment of yourself or others, that you become your biggest motivator.

A Pastor can preach all day from his pulpit, to an eager crowd of parishioners, but it isn't until those parishioners decided for themselves to follow the gospel of God, that they can begin to walk in the light of Christ. A coach can encourage you to lift weights and grow strong in the off-season to be better next year, but it isn't until YOU make the personal commitment to better yourself. A teacher can help your mind grow, but until YOU make the decision to grow your knowledge that you can truly succeed. The examples are endless.

Life is full of learning new things everyday. As a co-worker once said, if your not making mistakes your not learning. I want everyone to stop and think of a stressful time, whether it is at work, school, or in the sports arena--ask yourself why is this difficult?

The most obvious answers are:

Whatever you are doing is a new task or activity and it seems strange and foreign.
You don't feel ethically, legally, or morally comfortable with what your doing.
You don't understand why you are doing it.
You are unprepared, or unequipped to do the task completely.

All of those points are not only the reasons why a particular task is difficult, but your answers as well. Answer those questions and you undoubtedly will begin to see the light. The purpose of this post is to not let difficult times bog you down. Take on a hard challenge, by first accepting it. Once you can it accept it you can begin to solve. If you can never accept that you must face the challenge, you will never be able to overcome the difficult times.

I wrote this because today I had a new challenge. I played racquetball for the first time in maybe 2 years. It is technical sport, but challenging. As I reflected back on the past hour of playing, I didn't get frustrated because I lost, or couldn't preform well, I get excited about practicing and becoming better. This was me accepting the challenge that is racquetball. So go into school or work tomorrow or today (depends on when you read this) and take on a new challenge. If one isn't already in your lap go out and find one. I guarantee that after accepting, solving, and mastering, you will feel a full sense of accomplishment and satisfaction.

Free, Free, thank God Almighty, I am free at last !

2008-10-18T14:49:00.006-05:00

Resting and solitude--two words that are intertwined yet powerful. Resting is a simple act. It can come in the form of sleep, taking a walk, chatting with friends or reading a book in the sun. Solitude in my opinion is a necessary part of life. But too much of a good thing is always bad. I would venture to think that many triathletes also feel this way. It is an indescribable feeling to be set out for a 15 mile run at sunrise on a crisp fall morning, or gear up for a 60 mile solo bike ride. There is a certain sense of freedom that one has while pedaling or running into a sunrise, that feels empowering. This freedom is not something that should be taken for granted, because it can be taken away.

For most of us, it can be hard to think of when or why this freedom could be taken away. We are all law abiding citizens, with jobs, families, and hobbies. Yesterday, it became all too real that there are people in this world where that is not the case. My company is building an addition to a county jail in Houston. I was at this jobsite and part of a required meeting was to enter the jail where there are current inmates and criminals. Walking around the halls with the security guards and other co-workers was an eerie feeling. Convicts were in striped uniforms working about the halls. I for an instant felt trapped and nervous. There are no windows, so the light is only that from a fluorescent bulb.

Upon leaving, I was reminded of this freedom that we all have. Lets not take it for granted, because not everyone has it. Although all of the people in that jail deserve to be there for committing, what I am sure are heinous acts, it still is a depressing thought to be couped up in that building for the rest of your life. I know this is the case because of jail yard cemetery right next to the prison.

Stew on these thoughts for a minute. I guarantee that you can not begin to understand the feeling until you step foot in a prison like that. I never want to go back. So back to the two words, rest and solitude. I think every prisoner in that jail is all too familiar with both of them and that is why I chose to start the post with those comments, to get you to think what they mean to you and how to a prisioner they mean something entirely different.

Everyone reading this, do me a favor and don't go to jail !

The season Finale

2008-10-07T11:16:00.029-05:00

The following is my race report from my third Ironman 70.3 race of the year. I will attempt to recount the experiences both emotionally and physically throughout the race.

I had decided for a couple reasons to really relax the week before my race. The first reason was I had been fighting some pain in the middle of gluteus the past 2 weeks. So I decided I wouldn’t run on it all the week before the race. After all I had put 30 miles of running the week before. So all I did was a swim on Tuesday of 2300m, a 2.5 mile walk on Wednesday with stretching, and a continuous swim of 35 min on Thursday. I rested on Friday and went for a 10 minute swim in the lake on Saturday.

Saturday was spent lounging and relaxing. I ate brunch at about 11am which was a hearty eggs, potatoes, toast and vegetables. This was followed by a snack at about 3pm and dinner at around 7pm. I ate pasta with chicken, bread, and a salad. I had also eaten pasta the night before as well. Not to mention I had eaten Pizza on Thursday night and pasta and vegetables on Wednesday night. I think I did my fare share of carbo loading the week prior. I was feeling really relaxed and loose all day Saturday. I went to packet pickup and got my packet and some gels at the expo. I was excited to see that we got a free Headsweats hat with our race packet. After that I went to the hotel to check in. I did this then went to the mandatory bike check in at transition. Upon arrival to the race site, I noticed the first thing I didn’t like about the race. The transition area was in a field, and there was absolutely no grass in the field. It was dirt. This poses a problem for running into transition barefoot, because you will get a bunch of stuff all over your feet before you put them in your cycling shoes and running shoes. Anyways I will start my official race report.

I got a wake up call for 3:30 am on Sunday morning. I woke up ate my usual breakfast of a banana, cliff bar, ¾ of a cup of plain instant oatmeal with a teaspoon of honey on top. I had a liter of water, and 20 oz of Gatorade. I also took 2 endurolytes and my vitamins. I was out the door by 4:15. I had met a fellow racer through a local Texas Triathlon online forum and he needed a ride to the race so I offered. I picked him up at 4:30am and we began our drive to the race site. We got to the race site at 5am and loading the shuttle buses to get to transition. We got to transition waited around for body marking. After that I went in to begin my setup for race day. This took me a while. I was in transition by 5:30am and was finally done setting up by 6:30. I had to mix all my Gatorade, lay out my gear, pack up my nutrition, get changed into my tri clothes, divvy out my endurolytes for the run and bike. I decided a while back during a training ride to use a new nutrition plan. My plan was to eat 3 times per hour, and take 2 endurolytes for each hour I was on the bike. I will get to that later. Anyways, they ended up pushing the race start back 15 minutes because of compilations with busing to the transition area. So I had some time to just sit around and relax. There were quite a few top PRO athletes racing in the race. Including, Tim DeBoom and Simon Lessing. I was set up in transition less than 100 ft from there transition racks. I snapped a few pictures of Tim DeBoom’s bike see below. Tim DeBoom has won the Hawaii Ironman before. Tremendous athlete.
So on to the race, as all the competitors gathered around the swim start the sun was just beginning to rise over the dam wall. It was a nice scene with relatively calm waters. There was still a current, but would be in our favor on all legs except the first. See the route below.

There was a wave start for everyone under 29 and some older age groups 50+. I like going first, I hate having to wait around for the start while watching everyone go. The swim started as usual, and I needed about 5 min to get into my rhythm and let the crowds thin out. I drafted off some folks for the first leg of the triangle but after that it was spread out. I like to keep my line and since there was probably less than 100 people in my wave drafting didn't work, unless I went out of my way to do so. I stuck as tight as possible to the buoy line. I didn't waste any strength going to follow someone else on a different line just to draft.

The swim moves on, I get to the last turn and look at my watch, I notice my Heart Rate Monitor (HRM) is working in the water. It indicates my HR to be around 155 bpm. What I also noticed was that my total swim time was about 18 minutes. I found this hard to believe that I was so close to being complete with only 1 short leg left. At this point I began to increase my swim speed. My HR jumped to 160's and I ended up climibing out of the water in 25 minutes and crossing the chip mat in around 27 minutes. I will do a full re-cap of times at the end.

I hustled to transition and rinsed my feet off, put on sunglasses, race belt, helmet, and bike shoes. I decided to try something new for this race that I saw an individual do at Buffalo Springs. I used Ear Plugs on the bike. When you ride at 20+ mph for 3 hours it can be quite loud with the wind and all. So I stuffed some ear plugs in and set off.

On to the bike leg. I had previously ridden the bike leg back on Labor day weekend. I am now a firm believer that if you can ride a bike leg of any triathlon prior to race day do it. It made the bike course go by twice as fast and I felt really comfortable because I knew what to expect the entire time. Its a feeling that you can't get just driving the course. I will say that if all you can do is drive the course than that is better than nothing. Take a look at the bike course elevation profile.

To start the bike off I didn't want to hammer as hard as I did in Lubbock, because I had no legs left for the run. I knew the hills on the bike course wouldn't kill me either. So I tried to keep a pace of about 20mph and a HR around 150 - 160. This was easy for me to do and at times I felt like I could have gone faster. I held myself back some. Note that I say some, I did after the half way point allow myself a little more speed.

My nutrition on the bike I knew was key for this race.In past races I knew I had not been eating enough while I was on the bike. I learned this on one of my long brick days in training. I did a 41 mile ride followed by a 7 mile run and ate a bunch more on the bike and felt twice as good on the run. I averaged sub 8 min miles It was as follows. A gel right as I got on the bike. I drank my gatorade and water as I wanted to as well. No rhyme or rhythm to my drinking fluids. I would then eat a second gel no less than every 30 minutes. After the first aid station on the bike I grabbed another gel and figured to myself, I was hungry so I began to eat them every 20 min. I consumed around 8 or 9 gels, 2 salt pills on each hour, and around 75 oz of gatorade, and another 36 oz of water during my ride. I ended up with a time of 2:42:41.

Whenever I do a triathlon, no matter what distance, I am always excited to get off the bike and run. The longer the races, ie Half Ironman distance, I am always ready to just go run. I can't imagine what it will be like when the Ironman distance comes around. The bike overall went great and couldn't have asked for more. The entire time I was on the bike I was thinking that I might be able to break 5 hours in this race. I remembered my swim time was around 25 minutes and I knew I would be off the bike in almost under 3 hours. The thing is my HRM doesn't show total time elapsed view when its also shows my splits. I would rather see my splits to ensure pace is correct than total time. My transistion times didn't help my under 5 hour goal either.

On to the run, I hoped off the bike and felt fresh and ready to run. The first thing I did was put on my socks, shoes, and hat. I also wore my sunglasses. I ran out of transition and popped 2 salt pills. I planed to take 3 gels every 3o minutes. I ended up only eating 2 but ate about 6 more salt pills over the next hour. The run was hilly. I set out to run the first 6.5 at even pace and then hammer the second 6.5 My splits and heartrates are as follows:

Mile Time AVG HR

1 8:30 155

2 7:25 157

3 9:25 155 (bathroom break)

4 8:13 158

5 8:34 158

6 8:37 160

7 8:51 159 (cramping occured in left quad stopped for a second and massaged out and took more salt pills)

8 9:26 157 (the effects of the hills were beginning to wear on me)

9 9:19 154

10 9:27 152

11 9:12 153

12 9:59 155

13 7:16 157 (this was all psychological. I was able to strum up the strength to finish fast

Overall the run was okay. A few lessons learned. Since almost 3 miles of each 6.5 loop were on trails don't wear racing flats. The support of a racing flat is not kind to running over dirt and rocks. Second, since its a hilly run as shown below, do some specific hill work before racing it again. If this run was flat, I could have probably broken 5 hours. I know for a fact if I went back to Galveston where I did my first Half Ironman, I would break 5 hours easily. Much learned through these races. I feel, this season of racing I have shown the most growth on the bike. I can now easily average 20mph at a Half Ironman Distance race without wrecking my legs for the run. Now goal for next season do that at the full Ironman distance... :) Check out the elevation profile.

To sum it all here are my times and splits

Total time -- 5:10:30

Swim split -- 27:07 averaged 1:24 / 100M (course was about 200 - 400M short)

Swim AVG HR -- 156

T1 -- 3:22 (rinse off feet and put in ear plugs)

T1 AVG HR -- 160

Bike Split 56 miles -- 2:42:41 averaged 20.7mph

Bike AVG HR -- 150

T2 -- 2:09

T2 AVG HR -- 148
Run 13.1 miles-- 1:55:08 averaged 8:47 / mile
Run AVG HR -- 156

I am very pleased with this race and think it was a great race and way to end the triathlon season. Now on to strength training and marathon running. See some pictures below.

Hard Work Pays Off when you least suspect it

2008-09-22T11:35:00.002-05:00

So a week ago I decided to participate in the Tour Des Fleurs on Saturday 9/20/08. My only intention was to use this run as a training run on saturday morning. Many times running by yourself for 20K or 12.4 miles can be boring, so I figured why not do it with some 2000 others. So I signed up for the race on Friday 9/19/08. I went to the race and my only goal was to go even pace for the entire way or around 8min/mile. I went out and felt good from the start. The morning was cool and the air fresh. My splits are as follows:

1 -- 8:05

2 -- 7:56

3 -- 7:38

4 -- 7:45

5 -- 7:47

6 -- 7:45

7 -- 8:15 (I walked thru the aid station and took my Gel)

8 -- 7:53

9 -- 7:47

10 -- 7:38

11 -- 7:19

12 --7:38

.41 -- 2:58

So nothing too fancy or fast. I averaged 7:46/mile. So I get home and look at the results and low and behold I placed 3rd in my Age group. I was happy with that and I didn't even try. Apparently no one my age came to race that day, because 7:46/mile is not fast.

I now have to see if I got an award somehow.

On Saturday after the 20K I signed up for a sprint triathlon on saturday at 3pm the race was on sunday at 7:30am. I was only doing it for fun and a interval training day. The race was a 500m, 18mi, 5k. I was out of the in about 7:39. I knew there were 2 people in front of me because one was leaving transition and one was slightly ahead of him is what the volunteers said. So I said to myself, "F*%K it, lets hammer and see if you can win this race the entire thing!!

SO I hammered on the bike. I quickly passed the first guy ahead of me within the first mile and the other guy within the 3rd mile. I was riding my bike like I stole it. It was actually really cool to have a motorcycle escort and a lead car the entire race. I got off the bike with over a minute lead on the entire pack, or so I thought. I got passed on the run after mile 2, by a 35 yr old. Needless to say he is fast because his swim wave started 5min after me!!! I was still pleased with my run splits of 7:38, 7:08, 6:40. I thought since I finished 2nd across the line, but no. I go to look at the results and come to find out the 35 yr old, a 40yr old, and a 50 yr old all beat me by less than 3 min. O-well.. I still won my age group by over a minute.

It's interesting to think what I could have done if I hadn't spent the entire afternoon tailgating and drinking beers. My pre-race dinner consisted of beer, chips and dip, and hot wings. So fun days for me.

My total race time splits are as follows:

500m Swim: 7:39

T1 -- 1:42

18mi Bike -- 48:06 --averaged 22.0mph

T2 -- :35

5k Run -- 21:55 -- averaged 7:04/mile

So all in all a very productive weekend. I never thought I would have been able to achieve these things ever. Great Confidence Booster.

Its Official !!!!

2008-09-14T11:06:00.002-05:00

A beautiful sun filled day was what Ironman Wisconsin competitors was blessed with. This day was followed only by a gloomy and rainy day. For me this rainy day was more important to me than the sun filled race day. As I began standing in line at 6:30 AM to register for the 2009 Ironman Wisconsin race, I thought to myself, this is where it all starts. All of the running, swimming, weights, yoga, and cycling has gotten me to this point. Standing in the rain, at the crack of dawn waiting to spend $525.00 dollars to just to race in an Ironman. Some would call it lunacy to have to pay that kind of money to put yourself through the tortuous day of racing that is an Ironman, but I call it beauty.

The purpose of this blog was to have an outlet for my training and life while I pursue a dream of racing in an Ironman. After having witnessed one of these events first hand, I can see myself being closely tied to these events for a very long time to come. So it begins, the story of the next year.

I recently just registered for my second FULL marathon. It is in Austin, TX on February 15th. It will be nice to shift the emphasis from Triathlon training to running. I will also start to work on some weight training excersices after the triathlon season is over and through the winter. So with a positive outlook and a fresh body the training will commence.

So to everyone who reads this mark your calendar for September 13th and plan on being in Madison, Wisconsin. I need all the support I can get. To anyone who has ever done an endurance event, it is a great psychological boost to see a friendly face in the crowd at mile 20 of the marathon or mile 90 on 112 mile ride. Not to mention having someone there for you at the finish line of a race. I have raced in so many races where I had no support after finishing and its far better to see family and friends after racing for some 12 hours.

So to Grandma, Mom, Dad, Lauren, Donnie, Brooke, Jeff, Devon, Andrew, and William, I expect you to be there. And as Jeff said in his blog post, I would welcome and love anyone who would run along the sidewalks while I run the 2 - 13.1 mile loops in Madison.

Matt B -- I expect you to be there since it's only 2hrs from where you live.

Laura W-- You now have another reason to come up to Madison, other than just wanting to get a fish bowl and Wando's...

Another day -- Another year in passing

2008-08-26T06:44:00.008-05:00

365, thats how many days are in a year, 8760, that’s how many hours are in a year and 525600, thats how many minutes are in one year. A great deal can happen in one year. One can age and grow weak physically but, yet grow stronger and richer in wisdom. New friends are made and old friends grow more distant. New passions discovered and old passions re-discovered. How many of those 365 days, 8760 hours, and 525600 minutes are spent happy, sad, or just simply letting the clock tick. For me many of those hours and minutes are spent being happy. No matter how hard one tries it is impossible for all of those 525600 minutes to be spent in a joyous state of mind.

However for me the past year has been good for me but most of all it has been a year I will never forget for numerous reasons. Many significant things have occurred in the past year that have had large impacts on my life, not only for the current time being but also long lasting effects.

In the past year I moved to Dallas, Texas. I started working full time after graduating from college. It was truly the beginning of my adult life. Upon arriving in Dallas I continued to pursue a passion for running and triathlons that had began, unfortunately, too late in my college career. Much lay ahead of me as began living in Dallas. At various times shortly after moving I questioned the move to Dallas and my motives behind it. Now that one year is past, questions of motives are no where to be found.

As the days of orchestrated routine past, I began to notice how I would look forward to the smaller things in life as opposed to the large events like summer vacations or spring breaks. In my eyes this is all very necessary since when working full time your life is dominated by others and doing what you want any time is simply not an option. For me this was time spent with friends, cooking, running, swimming, and riding my bicycle. Many of the 8760 hours of the past year were spent in the pool, on the saddle, and on the pavement. Many goals were sought after and eventually achieved. The initial 2 goals of the last year were to complete my second Olympic Distance Triathlon and run my 3rd half marathon. In my last Olympic Distance Triathlon I finished with a time of 2:55:52. My previous best time in the half marathon was ahcieved in Nashville, TN at the Country Music Half Marathon. I posted a time of 1:48:15, if my memory serves me correctly. Initial expectations for both races were to simply finish and feel stronger than previous and post a time that was still respectable. I set a goal to spend time in the pool and increase and grow my ability as a swimmer. I truly put dedication to this and even though 5am came early I would show up 2 or 3 times a week at the YMCA and swim before work. The time spent was not wasted. As the days past my running ability strengthed. My stride became more efficient, my lungs capacity grew, and my body lost weight. All of this would eventually contribute to a stellar preformance in my 2nd olympic distance triathlon. I finished with a time of 2:37:13. It would take realizing victory over the triathlon before setting my 3rd goal for the year. A television show would be inspiriational in helping me to set my 4th goal for the year. The 3rd and 4th goals of the past year respectively would be to complete a Half Ironman distance triathlon and running a Marathon. They day came and past of running my 3rd half marathon. I finished with time of 1:33:34. Right at the outset of moving to Dallas I had achieved so much and was not ready to stop any time soon. Within the first 4 months of moving I was able to shave 18 minutes off of my Olympic Distance triathlon time and 15 minutes off of my Half Marathon time. At that point in my life, late December, I thought that I could achieve anything if I truly wanted to. Little did I realize that the rest of the year I would have many more exicitng times both with my racing and my life as a whole.

And so the training would begin for my first Marathon and Half Ironman concurrently. Soon after the training began I chose goals 5 and 6. I would register for 2 more HIM races in 2008. I knew at the outset it would be difficult and it would take time before it would feel comfortable. As Lance Armstrong says, you can’t fake a marathon. Anyone who has ever completed a marathon or Half Ironman (HIM) knows that you can’t fake them. No matter who you are or where you are at physically, you have to be prepared to both mentally and physically to race these distances. The biggest change from racing in Olympic distance triathlons and Half Marathons to longer distances is the actual time that the individual spends training each week. The hours increase and can some weeks approach 12 hours of training. This a great deal of time spent each week training. Long runs and rides tax the body and mind. For me I have learned so much about the minds ability to overcome the body’s weakness. The mind harnessed correctly will always win out over the body. I will get to that a little later. For me I felt it a good exercise to take my log book after writing in it for one year and tally the miles.

I swam 97 miles in pools, lakes and oceans

I rode 1,998 miles on bike trainers, roads, and spin bikes

I ran 890 miles on sidewalks, trails, and streets

When put end to end, I covered 2,984 miles.

I did all of this because I can.

To put this in perspective time wise I used some simple average paces as follows:

1:45 / 100m swimming pace
16 mph riding pace
8:30/mi running pace

This works out to the following numbers

45 hours swimming
125 hours biking
130 hours running

For a total of 300 hours of training

or on average 6 hours per week

or an average of 49 minutes of training per day for 365 days.

To me this is amazing and is a testament to the fact that through discipline, desire, and devotion anything is possible. I am Looking forward to tackling my last goal of the year before the big one in 2009, Ironman Wisconsin and looking back on that year after the race is complete and reading this post along with many others and seeing how things have really changed.

So keep swim strokes long and smooth, your pedal cadence high and run stride efficient and you too can achieve anything.

Brett

A Positive Way to Start the Weekend

2008-08-08T07:42:00.002-05:00

Here are a few quotes to start the weekend. I read these this morning and it just put me in a better mood and made me feel more greatful for what I have in life.

"The awareness to appreciate and keep perspective of what you DO HAVE each morning helps set a positive tone for rest of each day."
-JT

"Children are more influenced by the sermons you act than by sermons you preach."
-David McKay

"Admit your errors before someone else exaggerates them."
-Andrew V. Mason

And...

"I'm growing older but not up, my metabolic rate is pleasantly stuck. Let those winds of change blow over my head...I'd rather die while I'm living than live while I'm dead."
-Jimmy Buffett

Why Do You TRI ????

2008-07-24T12:11:00.002-05:00

So I was reading in the Tri Forum while I ate my tuna fish at lunch and came across this thread... Check it out:

Why Do You Tri??

So I thought I would do my own but also on my blog, since this is can be a very introspective exercise.

Why do I Tri???

Because I Can, otherwise why did you have legs and arms, what else are gonna do with them, we don't have to hunt for our food like our ancestors did ! And the second you can't swim, bike, or run you are gonna be wishing you had.
I used to be FAT
It gives me something other to do than work
I like to compete
I like to compete and never loose, this is why I love the individual aspect, the only person you have to loose to is yourself. The only way you loose is by quitting.
It keeps me healthy
It can hopefully inspire others to get into shape and become healthy.
If I didn't I would have to fill my spare time with something else and I don't know what that would be but it couldn't be more healthy than what I am doing now.
Because when I see a really FAT overweight un-healthy person, I think I never want to be like that and I am sure they don't either. If only they would have TRI'd"
I like the freedom, its something that only God can take away from me. I will always be able to swim, bike, and run. Unless someone steals my bike.
I like to eat.
I think it's cool how the human body can be trained to do anything
I like to push my mind to control my body, and what better way to do so then endure pain during a hard workout.
I love the feeling of butterflies before a race.
I love the feeling of accomplishment after a race.
Its better than just running.
Its cool
It makes people wonder how you do the workouts you do, but little do they realize that they could too if they only would TRI !
When I do an Ironman, I will have bragging rights for the rest of my life !
It's such a bad-ass sport.
It is possibly one of the only sports that requires you to be a very balanced athlete and rely only on your abilities.
Because, its not always your arms or legs that get you a 1st place, it's the stuff between your ears and in your chest. Its about having a strong heart and mind.
The bikes are really cool.
The girls can be really hot
Where else is pissing yourself acceptable
You have to have goals in life
The sport is as old as I am, it's so young that some of the best moments are still to come.
Because I get this excited, happy, and emotional feeling when I think about winning my age group at a race and qualifying to go to KONA
I love the people who do it with me, the friends I have met training, the enjoyment had with complete strangers at races. There is a connection that you have that can't be compared to anything less than a family.
Without Tri, I wouldn't be me, no matter what happens I will always want to be a part of it some way or another.

I could go on for forever about that. I welcome any comments to this, just reply back if you want.

Back to work..

Ironman Wisconsin

2008-07-22T22:12:00.002-05:00

So this evening I looked into flights to fly to Chicago and then bus myself to Wisconsin to volunteer for the Ironman Wisconsin 2009 race. It looks as if I can get there pretty cheap and possibly use my airline miles that I have accumulated from traveling. I figure this is probably a great idea for 2 reasons. First I will get exposed to the excitement and hoop la that surrounds an Ironman event and get a chance to ride the entire about 60 miles of the bike course and run good portion of the run course. This is a huge advantage for me to get mentally prepared for the race. The second reason this is a good idea is that there is almost a 100% chance I will reserve my spot for the race in 2009.

Other than those thoughts, I am moving right now and have been doing a little too much during the evenings and haven't been able to get my workouts in. However carrying heavy stuff for 2 hours on monday and tuesday night is not that easy either. So it's not like I have been sitting around on the couch. Tomorrow, I am going to try out the run again in the morning. I had some pains from after the Half Ironman and it really was just sore and strained. It felt really good for a while, but I have not really ran since my last olympic distance tri on 7/13/08. I also PR that race by about 4 minutes even though I rode an extra 1.8 miles on the bike because I got somewhat lost. I finished in 2:18 and change. The ankle hurt bad in that race. I ran an easy 2 miles after my 45 mile bike ride last saturday and it felt good. So I will try it back out tomorrow for a super easy 5 miles. So all those days off, I just Iced and rested it and took some NSAIDS. So we shall see how it feels. I can't stand not being able to run, but I know I need to just rest it. So if tomorrow goes good, I know I can get back to running, but if its sore, I will rest it some more and stick to swimming and cycling.

I will update later on how everything goes.

Check your attitude at the Door and have some RESPECT !!!!

2008-06-30T19:16:00.016-05:00

This is going to be a long post but it will accurately and descriptively tell my tale of what its like to race in a Ironman 70.3 race at Buffalo Springs Lake in Lubbock, Texas. Here are the results

As I rustled around in the sheets I peer over at the alarm clock. It read in bright red lights 6:13 am. It dawned on me then that hotel sheets at a Holiday Inn are not that nice, and it reminded me why I spent $80 dollars on my sheets I have at home. Anyways, it was Saturday morning and after falling asleep to a TBS movie at 9pm I arose quite early. After all I woke up at 4am on Friday morning. The room was still dark and cool so I decided to sleep some more. As the day moved forward I lay asleep and still in my hotel room. I ended up sleeping until 8:30 am. This was a nice change of pace for me a long nights sleep.

After I awoke, I headed to the EXPO one more time and ended up buying a crazy wild speedo, that I am planning on wearing in the upcoming DISCO Triathlon. Check out the link.

My first impressions of Lubbock reminded me a great deal of the city or lack there of that I once lived in called Lavonia. The city of Lubbock to me just seems like a place that many people never leave, and if they do leave they don't come back. I find it hard to understand why anyone would ever want to go to school there but they do. Some 30,000 people go to school there. If the information some co-workers provided me with is correct, Texas Tech, including graduate students has about 50,000 people. This accounts for nearly a 1/4 of the population in the city. Crazy huh?

So I headed to eat Brunch at an IHOP, not exactly the best dining, but you take what you get in Lubbock. There were numerous other Triathlete’s eating there as well. I sat alone and they seated another fellow triathlete next to me. We carried small talk about racing and the course in general. After this I packed up my car with my wetsuit, bike, and other supplies and set my compass for Ransom Canyon and Buffalo Springs Lake. See one may think that oh well your racing in Texas, it must be a flat and fast race. Oh the contrary, the race begins and ends in a canyon. To be honest, I didn’t know what to expect. All that I had seen was the elevation profile seen in my previous post.

Approaching the lake, the land was flat and barren. Much of the fields were plowed and desolate. Black and white images from an 8th grade history book suddenly came to life in vibrant colors. I thought of one thing the Dust Bowl of the Great Depression. It occurred to me that had all of the pictures I had previously seen that were tied in context to the subject of the dust bowl been in color, it would not have been so depressing. The color of the dirt is a bright and rich copper brown. It’s a bold color to say the least. Once past the gates of the park I scan the horizon and all I could see is a vast canyon off into the distance with a sliver of blue-green lake penetrating the middle depths. I snake my car around the perimeter of the canyon catching glimpses of the spring fed lake below, wondering when will I get to the bottom, how far do you have to go to get to the start. At that moment it felt like time stood still and I would never get to the transition area. Needless to say this would not be the last time I felt like this.

I finally arrived at the bottom and saw the transition area and beach. I parked my car and got out and got my wetsuit on and went for a practice swim. I swam about 7 or 8 minutes just to get a feel for what the temperature of the water was and if it’s really dirty or what, mainly so there are no surprises on race morning. The swim was relaxing and refreshing in the hot semi arid climate of Lubbock. As I made my way back to my car another person had just parked and was getting his bike ready for a ride. We began casual small talk about the water. Then as we both readied our bikes to ride he realized he left his helmet at the hotel. He was quite upset about this and was worried about being disqualified for riding without a helmet. Another and myself assured him this was only on race day that they would DQ for riding without a helmet.

This is also when I met Rich from Minnesota. He indicated as we mounted our bikes that he was going to ride the run course. This was precisely what I had intended to do. So we both set off for a casual easy ride to survey the run course that we both would eventually be taking on the next day. We set out and talked about various triathlon related things, bikes, training, swimming, etc. etc. As the time passed we completed our ride and Rich suggested we both drive the 56 mile bike route. I had considered this earlier in the day and wasn’t planning on doing it until his recommendation. See it was earlier in our short ride that learned that Rich had raced in some 12 Ironman distance races. He had been racing triathlons for some 20 years. I knew that Rich had a wealth of knowledge to share and if someone who has raced has much as him suggest to drive the bike course, I am going to listen. Not to mention I enjoyed the company. It can be weird going to races in different cities where you know no one, mostly boring until race morning. A friendly face is always welcome in my book.

So Rich parked his car outside the gates of the park. This was some 4 miles from the transition area. See the bike leg of this course goes like this: Hill, Flat, Hill, Flat, Flat, Flat, Flat, Hill, etc. etc. However those hills are challenging. We will get to that later. So we drove the course and parted ways. We agreed to meet a little before the pre-race meeting then go to grab some dinner later. It was at the pre-race meeting that we were treated to a traditional Indian song and dance ritual. I found this to be very interesting and have video taped a little bit of it an posted it for you to view on my blog site or embedded depending on the where you read this.

Indian Dance at the Pre Race Meeting

So Rich and I spent the next hour or two hanging out talking and eating dinner. We shared a bit about our backgrounds and families at home and so on. As it turns out we both like to eat pizza before a race. This was nice, because this has sort of become a ritual of mine before all my races and big training days. Before I knew it I was back at the hotel and climbing into bed.

Before I turned off all the lights I called to front desk to ask for a wake-up call. I requested a wake up call for 3:15 am. You might think this is early, but the race started at 6:40 am and it takes about 15 minutes to drive to the park plus time to eat breakfast, shower, and pack the car. The guy on the other end of the phone simply laughed and said "Wow your the second earliest wake up call." I asked what was the first and he indicated it was 3am.

Well as anticipated I woke up to phone ringing precisely at 3:15 am. I was thinking to myself the entire time that some of my friends were still probably awake at this time drinking or doing something crazy. I on the other hand was calm and excited to start my race. I showered and started my normal routine as always. I had my oatmeal, banana, Gatorade, water, and cliff bar for breakfast. Once I was done with that I was ready to pack my car.

Careful to not leave anything behind at the hotel I prepared everything that I would need for the race day on the extra bed I wasn’t using and laid it out very organized. I checked my list and crossed everything off. As I slowly packed my car with all of my race day essentials, I noticed in the distance lightening. I was worried of this and hoped that I would not cancel the race. I recently read of some others whose 70.3 race was cancelled due to lightening. I would have been furious just as they were if the race was cancelled. It was then that I reminded myself that I can’t control the weather and that I need not to worry of the weather but instead focus on what I can control, and that was mentally preparing for the upcoming race.

I arrived at the lake with plenty of time to spare. In fact I sat in my car for almost 30 minutes just sitting there listening to music and hoping for the rain to go away. I had a certain calm about my mind that morning. I don’t know if it was from confidence that I knew I could do the race but also uncertainty in the sense that I didn’t know how I would take on the hills before me. I guess you could say that I was confident but cautious. I knew that one way or another this race would be a challenge.

As the time passed I set up my transition area, covered my skin with sun screen, and pulled on the wetsuit. I made my way to the beach and hopped in the water, surprisingly the water was actually warmer than the air temperature. See it had rained the night before and the outside air temperature had cooled significantly. The water felt good, and warmed the body from the outside in. I swam a short distance to where to the starting line was and climbed back out of the water.

At this point an Indian prayer was chanted and the race was ready to begin. The race directors lined all of the triathlete’s up and readied them for the race to begin. I was set to go in the second wave of swimmers, so I was curious to see the pro’s then Age Groupers in front of me start. I was uncertain how the actual start of the race would be whether it was a mass running start or what. As it turns out it was a beach start and the water is so shallow that most of the Pros actually ran along the banks of the lake as long as they could for almost 30 or so yards then jumped in and began to swim. This was a little unorthodox but I figured what the hell when in Rome right?

So The gun went off and before I knew it I was in my rhythm running along a jagged rocky shore and then finally taking the plunge face first into the water to begin a 1.2 mile swim. I just started swimming like I do in the pool. Stroke after stroke, breath after breath, I found my groove quickly. I should have sighted a bit more right out of the gate but there were 2 buoys that were close together and I started swimming for the wrong one, and then quickly corrected my mistake. As with every triathlon I do looking back on it the swim always goes by in the blink of an eye. I finished my swim with a time of 30:19. This time puts me at a 1:34 per 100M pace. I am very pleased with this time. I was able to shave over 6 minutes off of my previous time of 36:45 in my last half Ironman.

On to the bike leg, the hills were tough. I knew what to expect, and got what I expected. There were numerous climbs as you can see from my previously posted elevation profile (see last post link). I took each hill one at a time, and just repeated the words I say to myself when ever I ride a hill, “JUST KEEP SPINNING” All that I try to concentrate on is keeping a high smooth cadence and minimizing all other energy expenditures, all the while getting my breath into a rhythm. This has never failed me before, and I don’t think it will anytime soon. My bike split ended up being 2:52:57. This averages out to a 19.4 mph for the entire 56 mile ride. I feel that this is a significant improvement over my last race because the last race had nearly ZERO elevation change and I finished with a 2:45:18. So while I went up by nearly 8 minutes I feel if right now I went back and did the same course from my last race I would easily better my time by almost 10 plus minutes. I look forward to doing this next year. What I wasn’t prepared for was how my body was going to react after riding all of those hills. I felt I had trained well and did plenty of Brick workouts, but I had never been able to ride hills then do a run.

On to the run, needless to say, my legs were toast. Right from the get go, I usually find a rhythm after about 2 miles and it just never clicked for me. I am ashamed to say I ran a 2:02:09 half marathon. This is the worst half marathon I have ever ran. I averaged 9:19 per mile. This was were I really lost the race in my opinion.

It’s always good to be humbled by a race, and this course truly did just that. I have a great deal of respect for the course hence the title of this posting. As it turns out I am not the only one who thinks this course is really challenging. A PRO athlete named Mirinda Carfrae mentioned in her wining acceptance speech how challenging she also thought the course was. Check out this link about Mirinda. http://www.slowtwitch.com/Interview/Get_to_know_Mirinda_Carfrae_208.html

To me hearing a PRO athlete say that about a course I just raced, really puts things into perspective. There are not many people who can relate to a PRO athlete the way an Age Grouper triathlete like myself can. That is what makes this sport beautiful. After the rest of awards were presented Rich, whom I previously mentioned hung out for a while talked about triathlons, and drank a few beers and listened to the live band they had for us. It was a nice way to end the day. The next morning we agreed to meet for breakfast. We met the next day for breakfast and went to IHOP. It was a great way to end the weekend. One of the many things I took away from this weekend is that this sport is not just about personal records and performances, but a lifestyle. Its about travel, and friends. Rich was a great person to meet, who helped to inspire me to become a better triathlete. I went to a city all alone didn't know anyone, but yet I walked away feeling accomplished and having got to meet someone who is very accomplished in this sport. Rich has been blessed with opportunity of completing I believe 12 Ironman races, including 8 at KONA !!! I think that is correct. If you reading this Rich feel free to correct me. Not to mention he is still faster than I am and quite a few years older than I am. I think its amazing what this sport will give back to you, when your willing to give up yourself to it. I have made friends, traveled new places, and experienced great things all through TRIATHLONS.

I also have some new goals for the time being, I really want to break 5 hours in my next Half Ironman Distance race. This way I can begin to get closer to being able to qualify for KONA or CLEARWATER. Baby steps though baby steps. Don't want to get ahead of myself seeing as I have yet to even race a full Ironman. The way I see it though is why not, as much ground that I have progressed in a year, anything is possible.

I see two things that I need to do in order to break 5 hours in the 70.3 race. These are ride about 100+ miles per week, with one long ride of 50 – 70 miles each week. Along with run about 25+ miles per week, with at least 3 miles being a brick workout and around a 10 mile LSD run (long slow distance). I will take this week off and start back with un-structured workouts and begin my formal training the following week. I will put my workout plan together with the goal of racing a sub 5 hour 70.3 in Austin. I know my swims will continue to improve and I can expect a few more minutes to be shaved off my total time along with my bike. I really just have to combine my running speed, that I know I have, and use it in the race. I will close with pictures from the race.

This is a picture of Rich and I on Monday Morning.

Crazy Hills in the Canyon

Lubbock Day 1

2008-06-27T16:57:00.002-05:00

So I left Dallas this morning at 5:30am headed west for Lubbock, TX. For those of you who don't know where Lubbock, Texas is in relation to Dallas, its 350 miles North West of Dallas. I arrived in Lubbock around 11am. We have a jobsite here in lubbock and I planned on working from there till now. I met with project team and took them to lunch and reviewed my role on this job with the engineer and electrical subcontractor foreman. It was good and everything has been going well with regards to my role. This is a positive thing.

I am now checked into my hotel. What is really neat about this race is that it is in the middle of nowhere and everyone racing is not from here. So, the expo and a bunch of events are that are at the hotel that I am staying in. They are also giving all of the triathletes a discounted rate. And the icing on the cake is that they are allowing late checkout till 2pm on sunday and then till 6pm for only a half day rate. This is great and I will take advantage of this most likely so I can spend my monday vacation day in Dallas as opposed to on the road. There is also a free awards ceremony dinner on sunday night. I might stay and go to this so I can see some of the elite athletes who win these races get their awards. Should be pretty neat.

Right now I am feeling very confident about the race. I think much of this stems from the fact that I have completed a Half Ironman already. So I believe, if you've done it once you can do it again. The hills should prove really interesting on the bike. I am curious to see what they look like in person. Check out the elevation profile for the bike at this link Hills So the hills might be hard and may affect the bike or they may be easy. We shall see.

Well I am just gonna take it easy for the rest of the evening

How to find what you love to do !

2008-06-24T20:11:00.002-05:00

This is for anyone who has came home from work pissed off at their job, wishing they didn't have to go into work the next day, or wishing they were doing something else when they were at their job. Or numerous other reasons we all stress from our jobs.

The below article was taken from this website: http://briankim.net/blog/2006/07/how-to-find-what-you-love-to-do/ I posted this on my facebook account back in November of 2007. I remember that stumbled upon it on the internet from some website. I really found it amazing and a good test. I have yet to do the test myself, because I can already see where it's going to go and I am not ready for that yet. I am still too content with my job and life right now. I guess you could say that right now in my life I like what I do, but I don't love what I do. So when will the fact that I only like what I do and not love catch up with me? I don't know the answer to that question. Another question will be will it be easier on everyone around me to go and find what I love to do now or later? Who knows? So for all those people out there older, younger and my age, READ this article and do what it says and let me know how it turns out. I think the very fact that I wrote the above paragraph just less than a minute ago has now made me committed to doing this excerise as well. I also want to now do it because I am sharing with people in my life and many others.

So here goes it, its long but stick with it and really think about.

This article was inspired by Steve Jobs’ commencement speech at Stanford University. In it, he says the advice we’ve all heard a thousand times:

“You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” - Steve Jobs

Well then, the question naturally arises:

How do you find what you love to do? It’s such a big question.

What absolutely boils my blood is that we hear we should be doing what we love to do all the time, but there’s not any step by step advice out there on how to find what you love to do. The advice that is out there helps to a certain degree, but it’s just a bunch of pieces thrown together with no coherent logical structure or order.

A perfect example is this. In order to find your passion, we are told to ask ourselves: “What would you do if you had a million dollars (tax free)?”

The typical answer ensues: “Well gee, I would put it in an account that yields high interest and live off the interest each year. Then I would move to Hawaii, buy a house, sip margaritas all day, play video games, go to the beach, swim, travel around the world, taste all the cuisines, read the books, play the sports, and on and on and on.”

Does this really help? Not really. Sure, you figured out what your lazy butt likes to do, but it doesn’t really answer the question that’s hidden, which is “How do I make money doing what I love to do?

What’s the result? People working in jobs they hate, feeling trapped because they can’t quit as they rely on that sole source of income to finance a lifestyle tailored to escape their grim reality, drifting aimlessly in life, in short, leading lives of quiet desperation, as so eloquently put by Henry David Thoreau.

Why don’t they just quit their jobs and pursue what they love to do you ask?

Two Reasons.

Reason #1: They don’t know what they love to do.

Reason #2: Fear. They’ve got a lifestyle to uphold, bills to pay for, families to take care of, fear of no steady source of income, fear of what other people might think or say about them, etc. Fear.

Conquer indecision in Reason #1 and ACT, and you will most definitely conquer all fear in Reason #2.

The very fact that you are seeking to find what you love to do (by the very fact you came across this article and started reading it) is a BIG step believe it or not. Many people in their lifetime avoid or do not even seek to find the answer to that question. They hear the question in their head but have become extremely adept at silencing it.

It is extremely important to answer the question on how to find what you love to do.

You must decide what destination to steer your life in. Otherwise, you leave yourself wide open for others to direct your life, as well as at the mercy of the winds and storms of life. If you know where your destination is, the rest is easy.

You will find once you know what you want to do, all uncertainty and burden will be lifted off your shoulders and you will have clear vision as to what your journey is and that journey will truly be joyful.

By the time you finish reading this article, I sincerely hope you experience that.

What about how to make money doing what you love?

The question of how to monetize doing what you love is certainly a valid one. There are bills to pay, stomachs to feed, families to support, etc.

Don’t worry about that for now. That will be covered later in this article.

First things first, you’ve got to find what you love to do.

Why is it so hard to find what you love to do?

The answer is:

It’s not hard at all.

You read right.

It’s not hard at all.

Then why are so many people having difficulty finding what they love to do?

Because they’ve never truly asked themselves.

What amazes me is that there seems to be a stigma attached to spending time with oneself. You have to constantly be doing something, whether it’s going to the game, drinking beer with the buddies, going to that hot party or club downtown, etc. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with doing all that, but I suspect the vast majority of people who engage in this “I have to be doing something every minute because I can’t be by myself” mentality are just putting up a front to show people how satisfying and fulfilling their life is, when in reality, it’s just the opposite. The irony here is that spending time with oneself is EXACTLY what you should be doing to lead a satisfying and fulfilling life.

People think you have to travel around the world, experience new things, etc to find what you love to do. No. You just have to sit down and decide. The answer is already within you. You just have to dig it up and avoid procrastinating. Your brain has absorbed all sorts of information and experiences and it has the answer ready to be unraveled.

Just let it out.

Be honest. Have you actually sat down by yourself with no distractions, with your sole focus on asking yourself what you love to do without picking up your cell phone, surfing the net, watching TV, chatting on AIM, listening to your favorite song, playing solitaire or minesweeper, checking your email, returning a call, getting a drink of water, going to the bathroom, looking at the clock, reading a magazine article, I could go on and on but you get the point. I’m going to go out on a limb and say you haven’t for the sole purpose of you reading this article. Why is that?

Fear of what the answer will be if you ask yourself what you love to do.

The answer is: I don’t know.

But that is exactly why you MUST find out. You’re avoiding the question because you know the answer is you don’t know, but that’s ok. Admitting you don’t know is perfectly fine. There’s nothing wrong with it. You’re way ahead of a ton of other people who learn to quiet the voice within that asks the question of “What do I love to do?”

And let’s say you’re one of the few people who actually specifically know what they love to do. The next thought that pops in their head is “Oh, I can’t make any money off of that.” The seed that was planted never grew.

I hate vague answers. I want clear, logical, definitive answers to questions.

So let’s do this.

Step 1: You WILL find the answer. No doubt.

You will find the answer. You will find it. No doubt.

Approach the question with this mentality and you are sure to find it. How long will it take? It doesn’t matter. Bottom line, you will find the answer.

By doing this, you automatically instill an anti quitting mechanism within yourself, because you know you will find the answer. If you know what you want to do, then you will do it.

For example, if you know you want to arrive in New York, you’ll find ways to get there. You’ll hop a train, bus, or plane going to New York and will arrive in New York.

If you don’t have the cash, you’ll borrow it, or get a job and save up, or get a job as a flight attendant to get there for free. It doesn’t matter how long it will take or what you need to do because you know you’re going to New York.

All your actions onward from the decision that you want to arrive in New York will revolve around getting to New York.

Read that last sentence again.

All your actions onward from the decision that you want to arrive in New York will revolve around getting to New York.

Finding what you love to do = Deciding to arrive in New York.

Step 2: Make a list of your skills and interests in two columns and WRITE THEM DOWN (I’ll explain why you must write things down later):

I’ve taken the liberty of creating a document you can print so you can easily fill in the blanks. You can download it here. KEY is to WRITE THESE DOWN!! I cannot emphasize this enough. Don’t think you can do it all in your head. WRITE IT DOWN.

When I mean by skills is any skill. It could be an intangible skill. Empty your clip here, list EVERY skill you have. It could be programming, making web pages, talking, listening, persuading people, typing, flirting, analyzing, giving speeches, making things easy to understand, whistling, blowing bubbles with your spit, it could be anything. Don’t be bashful. List everything you perceive your skills to be.

On your other column, lists your interests and don’t be shy here as well. List EVERY interest you could possibly think of. Spiders, shoes, hair, makeup, basketball, tennis, thinking of ideas, babysitting, walking, hiking, fireworks, helping people, making fun of people, fishing, tai chi, karate, seashells, seaweed, can openers, anything goes. Yes, I did say can openers. Your interests can also include subjects you are knowledgeable about as well. Computers, economics, biology, baskebtall plays, football plays, magic tricks, etc.

To help you write down more interests, think of what you were interested in at your previous jobs and write them down. Also, think of what you were NOT interested in your previous jobs and write the exact opposite.

Asking yourself the following questions may shed light as to what skills and interests you possess.

If you went in a bookstore, which section do you naturally gravitate toward?

Ask friends for any skills and interests they see in you. You’ll be surprised at how much insight they have on you that you’ve never thought of before.

What do you spend most of your time doing? What do you look forward to doing?

Go back and think of your accomplishments as a child. What kind of skills and interests revolved around your accomplishments?

What did people praise you on doing?

What did your teachers or parents say you had a skill or knack of doing?

Why am I emphasizing skills and interests here?

Skills: Because you’ve got to leverage what you’re strong with. And don’t say you don’t have any. Everybody has skills. You’ve just never sat down and thought about it and wrote it down. By using your skills, you’ve got a head start, a catalyst.

Interests: Simply because you’ve got to love what you do. By including interests, you include another form of an anti quitting mechanism.

Focus on generating as many skills and interests you can possibly think of and WRITE IT DOWN!

You may find that your skills are gravitating toward one or two particular skills. The same may hold true for interests. Keep that in mind for step 3.

Step 3: Set aside some TRUE alone time with no distractions to focus and figure out what you love to do by asking yourself the right questions.

It amazes me how people set aside time for taxes, cooking, watching movies, reading, but when it comes to their own personal future, they NEVER set aside any time. How much MORE time should you set aside to figure out the path that will make you happy?

Ok, you’ve set some private alone time with no distractions; now what?

You must ask yourself an extremely clear question. Clarity is key here. The clearer the question, the easier the answer will be.

For example, if I ask you what 12 times 12 is, the answer comes easily, 144.

However, if I ask, what is some even two digit number times some other even two digit number? Guess how long it’ll take you to answer that question?

Clear questions lead to clear answers.

Another key thing is to WRITE it down. I know you’ve heard it a billion times and it’s so cliché but there’s a reason. Writing things down allows you to easily make connections you’ve never thought of before because you see it on paper. It also allows you to “free room” in your brain for other thoughts because they are put in another container so to speak.

If I ask you, what’s 257 times 852, try doing that in your head vs. writing it down. When you write it down, the answer comes out easier, not to mention more accurate.

If you haven’t already wrote down your skills and interests in the previous step, STOP and DO IT NOW. It won’t do you any good having them in your head.

So, let’s use your alone time to ask yourself a clear question in writing. What is the question you should ask yourself? Is it: “What do I love to do?”

That question is a bit broad, so let’s narrow it down a little. Try asking yourself:

What would I love to do on a daily basis utilizing both my skills and interests that will add significant value to people?

See the difference here? The more detailed and clearer the question, the easier it is to answer it. Why did I add the add value part? Because that will lead you to find a way to make money doing what you love.

By incorporating the question of how to add significant value by utilizing your skills, you automatically filter out all the “common answers” that people come up with when asked what they love to do. Common answers such as: “I love to watch TV.” Or “I love to play video games.” Answers such as that discourage people because they see no way of making money from it.

Adding to that, many people tend to make the mistake of focusing on how to make money. A lot of people fail to realize that money is just a byproduct of adding value in the form of a product or service to people.

When you know how you can add value to people, you’ll know how to get money.

Open up Word or get out a blank sheet of paper and write that question up at the top. Here it is again in case you don’t want to scroll up.

What would I love to do on a daily basis utilizing both my skills and interests that will add significant value to people?

The KEY is to WRITE YOUR ANSWERS DOWN!! I cannot emphasize this enough. Don’t think you can do it all in your head. WRITE IT DOWN.

Looking at the two column list you made in the previous step, start writing down a list of answers. Just write. It doesn’t have to be perfect and it doesn’t have to make sense because sooner or later, you will connect the dots. Here’s a story to illustrate what I’m talking about.

There was a story about a small town with a ski resort which attracted a lot of tourists, which in turn helped the town’s economy. However, when it snowed, the snowfall collected on the power cables, until the weight was enough to collapse the cables, resulting in several power outages. Slowly but surely, tourists stopped coming, so the town held a meeting to discuss how to solve the problem of having snow collect on the power cables. Solutions were tossed out for quite some time.

Then somebody shouted in a loud voice from the back of the room and said “Let’s hang pots of honey on the power cables to make the bears climb up. When the bears climb up and get the honey, their movement will shake the snow off the power cables.”

The audience laughed and somebody else deciding to play along said “How will we refill the pots of honey?” “We’ll use a helicopter”, another person said.

Then the answer dawned upon them. By having a helicopter fly by the power lines, the wind from the propellers would shake the snow off.

The main point here is that answers, no matter how ridiculous they may seem, should not be feared because more often than not, they lead to results. It’s all part of the process.

Even if an answer seems ludicrous, write it down. Write down all your answers. Do it until you have 20 answers and look them over. You will find that as you write down answers and look at them, it will in turn propel you to think of new creative answers that you would not have come up with before.

You will be amazed at all the things you wrote and the different solid creative ideas that come about.

Now the time comes for focus.

I’m sure you’ve heard of the sun and magnifying glass analogy pertaining to focus but I’m going to say it again. If you try to do a bunch of things at once, nothing will get done. If you wave a magnifying glass around on the hottest day, you won’t burn anything. You’ll dissipate all your energy among the trivial many.

By focusing and harnessing all your power, energy, time, focus, thinking, etc. on one goal, you will be amazed at how deep and quickly you can accomplish that. Just as you steady a magnifying glass on a single object, with the hot burning sun rays analogous to your desire, focus, power, energy, time, etc, you will make an impact.

The notion of focus is so important that I’m going to use another analogy. Imagine you’re a cheetah and you see two juicy gazelles grazing in the grass. Spending your time chasing both = no food = death. Hunt one down. It might take time to catch it and kill it, but when you do, you’ll be recharged. You will soon start collecting information on how the gazelles run, which direction they run, where they like to graze, etc, which will help you catch more gazelles in the future, thereby putting you in a favorable cycle. Case in point, focus on one.

So look over your list you just made and choose one idea that seems the most appealing to you. You may find you can combine a few ideas into one idea. Nevertheless, choose one idea that you will garner the greatest satisfaction not just for yourself, but to other people.

You might want to zero in on the ideas that combine your skills and interests that you’ve listed in the beginning. The reason being, psychologically speaking, you’ve probably listed your greatest skills and interests first and then as you started listing them downward, so did your degree of skill and interest. This might not be true. You might have 20 different but equal skills and interests, which if you do, I congratulate you. Just a tip I thought I would throw out.

How Will You Know You’ve Found What You Love To Do?

Does it make you feel good? If you feel it in your gut that you’ve hit the jackpot, you’re right.

If your friend were to bring up the idea you picked, would you be all over it talking about it?

You have to have no reservations about it. If you feel the slightest doubt that it’s not your passion, then it’s not. You must hunger to overcome any obstacles to pursue your passion.

Update (03/15/2007): A reader just posted this comment way below (#87) and I wanted to include what she had to say in the article so you don’t miss it. I think it ties in very well here and is also well written. Thank you Bronwyn for sharing your story with us and adding such great advice to the article.

“So when you look over your goals, and one seems right, but you’re still finding excuses to not do what you have to do, that’s not it. It might be a close relative, but it’s not the one. Keep looking and you’ll find the goal that makes you counter every objection with a solution, the one where you’d happily pay whatever it takes, cash and years on the barrelhead right now. The path that makes you quiver with eagerness like a hunting dog on the point, the one over there you’ve been ignoring because you’ll have to learn a difficult new skill like drawing, or face big mistakes and big fears, and you didn’t believe you could do those things? That’s the one. Admit how much you really want to go down it, tell yourself you really can do it, and then your passion will take over and you will not let anything keep you from it. “

Once you have that, your search is over.

That, right there is what you love to do.

As for how to make money off of it, you might have already found ways when you wrote down your answers. If you still want to find more ways to make money doing what you love, just follow the same steps.

Step 1: Know you will find the answer.

Step 2: Write a clear question, write down the answers, and you will be amazed at the many ways you can make money from it.

I’ll leave the money making question up to you, but it shouldn’t be hard to do.

Now that you know what you love to do and how to make money from it, you must ACT.

That’s a whole other story. Most people get to this stage but don’t act and it doesn’t make any difference in their lives.

Comfortably Numb

2008-06-20T21:59:00.002-05:00

As I sit here on a Friday night at 10pm in my apartment by myself I am sitting here thinking two things. One what are you doing staying in and going to bed at 10pm on a Friday night. Second is of the thoughts that will soon be wandering through my mind as I ride 40 miles tomorrow morning while the sun rises over farmland in south Dallas. I purposely am staying in so I can go ride tomorrow morning. I also have come to the conclusion I almost prefer to ride by myself sometimes too. Tomorrow will be a day in which I will wake up rested and relaxed and feel great about the day to come before, during and after my workout. See tomorrow I will be on the bike for a little over 2 hours all alone, probably not a car to be found on the road. This 2 hours will be a great time for reflection and mental preparation for the upcoming race in a week. Staying in for tonight is all worth it for just tomorrow morning.

The week sped by and before I knew it I am sitting here on Friday. I have a very good outlook for this weekend. I am hoping it will be a very relaxed weekend, which is what I need. For the next 2 weeks will be very busy at work and in my training and racing. I will comment on one thing and very few people who read this will understand but to be blunt, I had a lot of fun last night, and we'll just leave it at that.

Following the ride I will be going for a 30 -40 min run I will be testing out my Tri Top. I bought a zoot top to help block the sun off my chest and back and maybe keep me cool??? We shall see what its like to ride and run it in. I tried swimming in it on tuesday morning and it wasn't bad at all. It will be great under the wetsuit. Lets hope the Tri Top doesn't chafe or rub me wrong. I am testing it out so I don't go into the Half Ironman blind with out knowing what its like to ride and run with a shirt on. Sounds funny but true.... I have never worn in a shirt or tri top in any triathlon I have ever done.

So I leave you here tonight comfortably numb and peacefully sleepy.....

Quote

2008-06-16T20:18:00.001-05:00

The future is here. It's just not widely distributed yet.....

--William Gibson

A thought of what may come.....

2008-06-15T21:04:00.002-05:00

A boy in a small town gets a horse for his birthday. Everyone in this town is so happy for the boy. It is a great thing for the little boy to have a pony and the small boy could not be more happy.

Many years later the young man is riding his horse and falls off and breaks his leg. Everyone in the town says how unfortunate it was that the boy fell and broke his leg. Everyone in the town shares their sympathy with the small boy.

A few weeks later a war breaks out and there is a draft, all the men in town are drafted to serve their country. The young man is unable to go to war because he has a broken leg. All of the other young men are killed in a horrible battle. Everyone in the town thinks how fortunate the boy is to have broken his leg as not to go fight in the war.

What does this all mean, think about for yourself. In this case, Good begot bad, bad begot good. Could it go on for ever, will it go on forever? I don't know and no one can be for sure. So what moment are you living in the seemingly good (getting that horse for your birthday) or the seemingly bad (sitting with a broken leg).

Even if you may think you having a rough time in life, always remember this story and always be looking forward to what better things may come.

So after a little break time, I have some good news to share. I have finally broken the ranks of the Age Grouper Triathletes. On June 7th I raced in a triathlon in Dallas. It was only a sprint distance race but still a fast one. The distances were a 400m swim, 11 mile bike ride, and a 2 mile run. I completed all of this in 50:46. I won FIRST PLACE in my age group. I am in the 20 - 24 year old age group. There was a total of 300 people in the race and 22 in my age group. Follow this link RESULTS I would have broken 50 minutes but in my transition #2 (from bike to run) the bike rack fell over and I couldn't just leave my bike on the ground and not rack it. For 2 reasons its a penalty and then all other 5 people who would have to rack their bikes after me would not be able to. No worries though I still got first place and took my trophy home. My friend Mike also got first place in Clydesdales. I also didn't really push myself on the run, because I knew I had already won my age group. I only average 7 min miles. The wednesday before I ran 2 miles after a 21 mile bike ride at 6:30 per min miles.

Needless to say it was a great feeling to win this. When I started running and doing triathlons, never did I think I would win races. Here I am now, actually getting pretty good a racing these things. I mean I did the Katy Trail 5k this past May, and I got 5th in my age group out of 56 people. I guess I am now beginning to realize that I actually might have a little bit of talent at this stuff. I still am humble and don't think I do. My friend Mike says that I have talent but I don't believe him. This stuff is still hard for me, even though I might make it look easy. I am looking forward to a better week of training compared to last weeks. I was in Long Beach, California and only ran 1 day last week, then caught a little cold from the travel and shaking hands with people for 2 days straight all day long. So ease back into this week and make the commitment to do around a 3 hour ride next saturday morning. I am going to go all by myself back down to Lancaster, TX. I am gonna ride my hill there for a bit too. I love that hill because someone spray painted on the road "You can do it!" Then after this weekend is Buffalo Springs Ironman 70.3 I am really excited for this because some of the greatest racers in the sport of triathlon will be there. I mean the beauty of the sport of the triathlon is that I get to race shoulder to shoulder with past world champions in the sport. How many other sports that you can participate in can you say you get the chance to play with best of the best. I mean I am just a normal average guy, and I am getting to race with equivalent of the Troy Aikman or Michael Jordan of the tri world. Pretty cool huh? Off to bed for now, and maybe start reading a new book tonight.

How do I know I am ready ?

2008-06-02T21:51:00.002-05:00

I stumbled upon someone's website tonight and thought I would make a quick post about it and provide a link to it. A few things stood out to me...

1. I went running with a friend the other day and we had casual conversation and I said something and she said that it was very deep. Well she may have just been bull shitting me or be serious, either way I took her literally. I have been told this many times by different people about alot of the different comments, quotes and sayings and more or less the way I think about life in general. I was reading this guys website about Ironman racing he said something that made real sense. What he was dscussing was what he thinks about when he runs, swims, and bikes. Then I started to think about this, and I realized that many of the things I say or comment on to friends, that in some ways could be "deep" or "meaningful" I have thought about while I was running alone or on the bike alone. Then I realized again, how this sport has made me a different person all around.

2. I read this article on his website called "How do I know I am Ready" and it made me realize that I am going to be ready, and that this season of racing isn't about goals or times or anything. Its about getting myself ready for next year and my quest to become an Ironman.

So that is that about the website, but its pretty cool and his articles are good, but I don't think he updates anymore.

Another quote that I saw the other day in a magazine was from an Addidas ad. It read as follows:

There will be days that I don't know if I can do a marathon, but there will be a lifetime knowing that I have.

Its so true for anything. If you have done it once you can do it again, maybe not as fast or as easy, but you certainly can do it again.

Personal Success

2008-05-28T20:21:00.000-05:00

So here is a little story about me and some friends. So a few years back, I used to be on the heavier side, as in I weighed 253 lbs and was like a fat tick that had been sucking on the hind side of a cow for 3 days. I loved to smoke, drink, and eat unhealthy foods like a pirate enjoys rum. The only problem was that by leading a lifestyle like this was what led me to be so over weight. So one day I stepped on a scale and decided to change it all. I wanted to eat better, exercise and loose weight. The way I went about doing this was to begin by eating 3 meals a day and raising my heart rate for a minimum of 30 minutes per day at least 5 days a week. The main exercise that I would do was running. I would get on a treadmill and run for 30minutes everyday no matter what. As I began this process, the weight began to drop from my bones like the rain from the sky. At first it was hard then it became easy and enjoyable.

I guess I have better will power or self-control and some people just can’t do it, but loosing weight is simple. Don’t eat shit and exercise. Also works out to this simple equation:

Calories Burned Per Day > Calories Consumed Per Day = Weight Loss

It’s that simple people. Anyways through this process I lost a bunch of weight and I am now down to 178lbs. Thru this whole process it wasn’t the big losses that impacted my life the most it was all of the big gains. What I mean by that is I gained something that has truly had an impact in my life in some many ways. I gained a love for running, and eventually swimming and biking. This new found love an appreciation for an active lifestyle have not only impacted my outlook on life but I feel have had an impact on others lives as well. This was most apparent this past weekend in Madison, Wisconsin.

Back in November 2007 a long time friend Laura approached me about running a half marathon. I gave her a run down on everything I knew about running and all of my lessons learned. I told her that day that if she signed up for a half marathon, I would come and run it with her and support her the entire 13.1 miles. Well come February of this year she signed up for her first Half Marathon in Madison, Wisconsin on Memorial Day Weekend. It also turns out that my sister lives in Madison. So I planned on visiting with them and hanging with my friends for the long weekend. While all of this was happening my sister has become a triathlete and set her sights on a sprint distance triathlon. I was so happy to hear that she has also found the sport that I love.

On Saturday morning I went with my sister for her first open water swim in Madison. I could tell she was a bit nervous but I knew all along she would do just fine. We got into the water and swam for about 25 minutes. It was a good swim and the she came out of the water saying all the same things that people who have never swam in open water say the first time they swim. I gave her a few pointers here and there but she did great, and I was really happy to be there for support.

Endurance sports are an enigma in the sense that while you are racing you have no team to support you but you can rely on others for encouragement and support while racing. Its perplexing but every race I have ever done people will also be there to encourage you and help push you forward. To complete an endurance event requires that one put time and effort into training for it. Most of this training is many times done solo, with just yourself and no one else. It can be mentally taxing at times but rewarding. In fact it is one of the reasons I like the sport because, my training time is my time and no one else’s time. So with all of that being said, I wanted to be there for my sister and for Laura as their team.

I am glad to know that I can help support others in their effort and search for endurance sport achievements. I am appreciative of the fact that I was able to run with Laura for 13.1 miles and encourage her along the way. It also was extremely nice of her to say that she enjoyed my presence along the course and express her gratitude for the encouragement I provided her. That was one of the best feelings in the world to hear her say those words.

With this story now being told I want to bring it full circle and comment on how my losses (weight) turned into gains (love of running), which in my heart has made me who I am today. I also feel like this transformation that I have undergone has had an impact on others lives as well. I can think of numerous people who are close friends or family that gone and since done similar endurance type events to what I have completed. I have since day 1 always encouraged everyone and anyone who expresses interest in running in a race or something to do it. I am always glad to offer anything I can do to help them along the way as well. I hope that I can eventually reach out to many other people to set a goal and achieve it.

There is no better way to describe how you feel after completing an endurance event; that is “PERSONAL ACCOMPLISHMENT”. I feel that the reasons for this are numerous and plentiful as the sea is deep. One of the major reasons this feeling encompasses your body when you finish an endurance event is that “YOU” and no one else but you ran that 13.1 miles or swam, biked, and ran 140.6 miles. All of this you did and no one can ever take that away from you no matter what. I am glad to see others achieving personal success and allowing me to be a part of it, for that I am grateful.

Have a good day!

This busy life, this busy life, we're all just hanging on...

2008-05-09T20:29:00.005-05:00

Well I had a 6 mile tempo run this evening and wanted to make it 7 but I had to cut it short. For quite sometime now, I have been interested in purchasing a pair of racing flats. The reason for this is 2 fold. One its widely known amongst runners and published many times in runnersworld that a runner can shave 2 seconds off his mile/min time with each ounce you drop in shoe weight. The current shoe that I have been wearing weighs in about 13 - 14 oz and shoe I purchased weighs only 9.5oz. I purchased the Zoot Ultra Tempo +. I suggest you click on the link and check out all the specs. So right off the bat, I am shaving approximately 4 seconds off my minute per mile time and in say a 6.21 mile race this would equate to a total of almost 50 seconds off my entire race. That is alot of time. The second biggest factor is that it gets hot in Texas and I sweat profusely, especially my feet. My other running shoes may start out at 14oz but by the end of 7 - 13 miles they could weigh upwards of my guess 20 oz. I know after my Half Ironman, my shoes felt like bricks, from all the sweat and water I was pouring on myself. So these ZOOT shoes have special drainage holes and also don't hardly retain any water. This was one of their goals in design. I feel this will help me significantly. They also are designed to wear barefoot, so I can save an extra 30 sec in transition.

So today I went for my first run in them and I wore socks of course and will slowly start to not wear socks a little bit each run every now and then. Because remember these shoes are also only for my races. All I can say is that I felt fast and I think that guy in the store that told me he is very surprised someone recommended me the shoes they did 3 years, because I needed a neutral shoe and not a mild stability shoe. I felt smoother running in the and my foot strike felt more natural. My next pair of shoes will not be a pair of New Balance 768's. I will go with what he recommended a pair of Brooks Defiance. For me I always thought if its not broke don't fix it but, I guess it always helps to get another opinion on what type of shoes I should wear. I think I will go to another store and see what type of shoes they recommend as well. I will also not tell them what I wear and I what others have said. This will be like my own little science experiment.

So this is a big training week for me. I have about almost 6000 yards in the pool, I will have almost 20 running, and end up with about 65 miles on the bike. I am doing the Memphis in May Olympic Distance Triathlon on Sunday. Its in Memphis obviously ! We have a free place to stay so Tommy, me and Mike are all gonna do it. This will be Mike's first long distance triathlon. Its gonna be a great day for him.

For me, I am just excited to race and be amongst good company. I feel like I can set a new PR for myself and hope that the weather is great. I am looking forward to averaging above 21 mph on the bike, and also hoping to hit less than 8 min/mile on the run. For the swim, I would like to see myself end up with a time of about 26 - 28 min. I really want to ice my transitions too. I will be for the first time trying to jump on the bike with shoes already on it. I think even though I don't use rubber bands when I practice I am gonna get some and try it on Saturday evening. I am actually really glad I am doing this race before my next Half Ironman race. It will be another good gauge for how my training has gone since my march race. I did alot of traveling and didn't do all I wanted to do.

But really the truth is work is really busy and so is training. I just have to start to suck it up because I also know that there will be times at work that it is not so busy too. I am thinking today I will put another quote on the wall to look at. I already have:

Discipline is doing what you don't want to do so you can do what you really want to do.

I will add this one or something like it...

Even if you had a bad day, an evening workout will always make you feel better.

These quotes are kind of for morning and night respectively, in that when you want to hit snooze, don't because if you do you will never get the joy from finishing that second half ironman. And also when you just want to eat and go to bed at 8pm don't because you can get in an hour workout and then eat and be in bed by 9pm instead, and if you had a shitty day the endorphins from the exercise will make you feel even better.

Oh by the way if you see these things in the grocery store called sweet potatoes buy them. They are great, and you can really easily cook them in the microwave and unlike a potato they actually taste good with nothing on them, and I think they might be better for you too, I am not sure on that one. I am now hooked and they only take like 6 minutes and they really fill you up.

Too busy at work to post but not too busy to work out

2008-05-08T21:35:00.008-05:00

So I haven't posted in a while, but its mainly been because I have been working alot then I come right home and either work out or just go right to bed. Last weekend I went on a trip to Austin, TX. I was able to take my new car that I got since my old one got totaled. I purchased the same thing a G35 4 door car but its a different color, graphite silver. My trip to Austin was for a 90 mile ride from Austin, TX to Shiner, TX. The reason we rode to Shiner was to visit the Shiner Bock Brewery The ride proceeds went towards the Lance Armstrong Foundation. It was a fun time. My 2 friends Mike and Tommy also did the ride with me. We stayed in one of the nastiest hotels ever. But we probably spent less than 16 hours there the entire weekend so it wasn't bad for the price. We ended up only riding 85 and we made it to the Brewery and proceed to eat fajita's and drink ice cold shiner bock beer. I have posted some pictures below. My friend Tommy had 3 flats during the ride. They only gave you 4 free beers and you couldn't buy more, but us being the people we are, managed to have a few more. A great time was had by all. After the ride we had motor coaches take us back to Austin. Once in Austin we met up with a friend of mine Ann. I met Ann through my old girlfriend and I always have a great time hanging out with her.

I had a good series of workouts so far this week. I took sunday and monday off to recover from the ride and rest my body. On tuesday I did a 6 mile run in the morning, then on wednesday I swam 2500yds in the morning and did 30 minutes of yoga in the evening. Today on thursday, I did 20 minutes of Yoga in the morning and I had speed work this evening. I was a bit apprehensive as I haven't done track speed work in a while. I normally only do tempo runs that are close to half marathon pace or about 7:00 min per mile. So today I started off with really easy jogging for 2.5 miles to the track, then when I got to the track I proceeded to do 4 x 800m intervals at 3:00 minutes per 800m with a 1:45 min rest interval in between each 800m. I finished it off with some plyometrics, or like skips, and karaoke twists, etc. Then I had an easy 2.5 mile cool down run back to my apartment. So I logged in 7 miles today. Tomorrow, I am planning to go for a nice easy ride for about 1 - 2 hours after work, and scheduling a 15mi run on saturday morning.

What has been nice lately is that I have been riding my bike to work. Its great because I don't waste gas, its good for the environment, and it takes almost the same amount of time to drive as it does ride. I think I will begin to do this more often especially since my work has now changed our dress code. I no longer have to wear a tie to work. I am now allowed to just wear khakis and a button down. This is way more conducive to riding a bike to work as opposed to slacks and a tie.

Training has been good and am a little tight from running but will continue my yoga and all will be good.

Blazing a Trail

2008-04-28T06:56:00.007-05:00

So I traveled to Red Top Mountain State Park in Georgia this past weekend. This is about 35 miles north of downtown Atlanta. I came upon this destination for a wedding. Friends of mine, Dusty and Leslie, got married this weekend. The wedding reception and ceremony were absolutely amazing. The surrounding woods and trails were a gorgeous setting for a wedding. The actual reception was held at a plantation house. It was a great time for all.

On Saturday morning, I was able to take advantage of the locale for the event by doing some trail running. Once again for the second weekend in a row I realized that while Texas is great, it doesn’t offer much in terms of beauty or hills or nice outdoor scenery. These trails snaked around Lake Allatoona and climbed through the hills of the mountains. Starting off I knew from looking in the hotel guest book that there was a 5.5 mile loop that I could run. I set my mind on Friday night that I would run this route in the morning. So in setting out for the trail I asked the front desk for directions and they indicated that I could pick up the trail and follow the yellow marks for what was called the Homestead Trail.

With the first step on the dead pine needles and leaves, I knew that this was going to be a good run. I immediately noticed how with each step I rebounded significantly quicker and felt more of a spring in my step. I haven’t ever done much trail running, but have read up on in it runners world before. I was very happy with the way it was starting out. The ground provided a cushioning that is not comparable to anything man made. The rigidness of concrete, asphalt and steel, provide no cushioning against the pounding impact of each stride. I didn’t know what I was in for either. The trail had many climbs and descents.

The trails I hoped would be hilly and fun. I took cautious steps as I begin to climb the first of many hills. Trail running is not as simple as lacing up your shoes and heading out the front door. It’s critical that you have heightened senses on your run. A trail is place of raw untouched and ever evolving terrain. It at times seems as if it is devoid of anything that a normal runner is used to, cars, concrete, stoplights, bikes, and all of the other items that a runner comes into contact with on a daily basis. I could run this trail twice in the same day and each time the trail would present itself to me in a different way. When you run on a trail its crucial to be ever vigilant of each future foot strike. Each time that you strike the ground you never know if a rock will roll or a root moves and if mud is not solid. It provides a challenge to have a keen sense of what you are about to do before foot hits the ground. The uphills were steep long and the down hills were a quad punishing delight. Running hills is great because you are able to challenge your leg muscles on the way up and forces you to work them in a completely opposite way on the way down. I can compare it to squats on the way up and more of a balancing act and restraining challenge on the way down. What’s more challenging is when you are running hills on trails, because with each stride down the hill you gain speed and momentum, and this is when it becomes ever critical to make sure that with each step you have secure footing. Because at any moment you could slip and roll down into the ravine that is to your right and stream that has sharp jagged rocks protruding. Needless to say it was a challenge. Some of these hills were sustained grades of 15% with durations from 400ft to .5 miles. I have included some pictures of the elevation profile and some shots of were I was able to run.

What was most interesting is I completed the first loop and realized it wasn’t the entire 5.5 miles and I had to cross the street in the state park to continue it. So I ran and just chose my path and ended up running closer to about 7 miles for the day. I ended quite a ways away from where I needed to be when I started following another trail. It was then time to look at a map and go back to the lodge. All in all it was a terrific run on a great Saturday morning.

It was also nice to catch up with all my old college friends, I haven’t seen many in a long time and all I can say is when you get us all together like that is some things never change no matter how old you get. My friends are dropping like flies and getting married one after another. It makes you stop and think how far away I am from ever getting married. Hell, I don’t even have a girlfriend. I also hope for these people that are getting married that they have long lasting marriage with many happy days to come. I have seen 2 of my fraternity brothers have their lives ruined by their wives because they caught their wives cheating on them in the first few months after marriage. It’s terrible to have this happen, but it happens. So congrats to Dusty and Leslie and I wish them a long and happy life together.

The Will of the Hill

2008-04-18T21:02:00.003-05:00

Ever since moving to Dallas there has been something different about the state and the city that just isn't right. After being here for almost 8 months I have finally put my finger on it. The terrain of Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, and NOT Austin, SUCKS!!!. I like everything there is to like about Dallas but I hate the fact that its surroundings are so bleak and flat. Just this past Tuesday, I was in Tarrytown, New York for work. This is some 30 miles north of NYC. I had the pleasure of going for a 45min run just before sunrise. What made this run so pleasurable was the fact that I was able to run almost up a hill for the entire time. It was great. As I set out from the hotel basically running along side a highway, I noticed a castle of sorts at the top of the hill. The castle was positioned in such a way that the rising sun made it difficult to see anything but an outline. I knew for certain though that it was a castle, the turret stuck out like a Rook on the end of a chess board. I thought to myself as I ran on brisk morning, some 30 degrees out, "Wouldn't it be cool to run to the top of that hill and see that castle. My goal for the morning was to run some steep hills. I ended up cutting across a 4 lane road to get to a side street. The reason I did this was because I could see that the street began as a very steep hill. So I ended up just running up this hill, and I remember coming around the bend and saw an even steeper hill and was just so excited.

I know many would think why would you be excited to run up a hill, "Isn't that more difficult?" why yes it is more difficult. However when you live in a place like dallas and run and ride your bike as much as I do it can get very boring riding solely on pancake flat roads. Its as if when I ride and run in Dallas you are on a treadmill of sorts, just never ending.

So the run in New York was great, and here I am in San Clemente, California as I write this blog. I came here for a friends wedding. My friends Mike and Andrea are getting married this weekend. The people here this weekend are the first people I met when I came to Dallas. They are great people and I was very excited when I was invited to their wedding. I was excited for 3 reasons, Weddings are fun, it was very nice of them to invite me having only known me for a short period of time, and I really have wanted to go to California for a long time.

Well here I am sitting in a hotel room getting ready to go out for dinner. I just took a drive down to the beach and pier. All I can say that as soon as I left the airport, I saw something that I miss. I saw mountains and hills. I began to think, to myself well Brett you moved to Dallas and didn't know anyone, why not move to California. I would have near perfect weather to train in year round, and hills. What more could a triathlete ask for. It just really makes you start to think about what your doing and where your going.

So my plan for tomorrow is to wake up at about 8am and eat an apple and cliff bar, then drive to the beach for about a 20 -30 min swim in the open water. I brought my wetsuit and swim goggles, and bright yellow swim cap. I am super pumped for this. I will be sure to bring my camera to take pictures. It may not be the smartest idea swimming alone but I am sure there will be surfers and I will try to get my friends to come with. Other wise this could be my last will and testament if I drown. Much love to everyone, but thats not gonna happen...

Then after the swim, I am gonna go to my car and change into my running clothes. I plan to do a 6 - 8 mile run. I brought my fuel belt with me too, so I can tote my camera and take pictures while I am running. It is just so beautiful here and it makes you happy to be alive and just be outside. This is one thing that I don't recall ever saying about Dallas. Its just so ugly in Dallas.

Now Austin, TX that is another story.

I will post some pics from the run and swim in my next post.

The entangled and weird Friday and the rest of the weekend.

2008-04-13T18:09:00.009-05:00

Lets begin this odd and interesting yet scary tale that was my Friday, April 12, 2008. It all began well with hopes of a short day at work followed by going with a friend bike shopping, then maybe a few cocktails and in bed a decent hour so that I could go for a long bike ride on Saturday morning. Needless to say my evening ended the same but its what happened in between that will make you realize there are so many things in life that you cannot control. With that being said it is important to appreciate yet be cautious of all that which you cannot control.

So my day started good, I went for a 4 mile run in the morning. The last almost 2 miles I ran without listening to any music. This was a nice change and it was very peaceful, as it was so quite at 5:30 on the Katy Trail. I had sent a message to fellow colleague Patrick, asking him if he could pick me up at the U-Haul Shop where I was having a hitch installed on my car. I was having a hitch installed so that I could get a bike rack and haul my bike and friends bikes without having them scratch the paint on my trunk lid. I had arranged the previous night to go help Sarah shop for a road bike and she would be taking me to pick up my car in the afternoon. Well Patrick and I drove into work and started our day. At about 9am that morning Patrick got a call from an old friend who he used to work with at Turner's Corporate office in Dallas. Patrick's friend Dean had been in a car wreck and wanted Patrick to bring a camera to take pictures to document the scene. Patrick obliged. 45 minutes later Patrick came back to the office with the camera and the first thing he says is... "Brett I now know how your car would preform if it were ever in a wreck." Patrick uploads the pictures to his computer and to my surprise his friend Dean drives an Infiniti G35 just as I do. Turns out Dean was waiting to turn left at a light and so was a semi truck and the truck was in the outside left turn lane and took the turn a bit sharp and dragged and crushed his car almost 50ft. The car was a wreck and totaled. However most importantly Dean was uninjured and everyone was okay. It was interesteing to see the car similar to the one you drive in pieces.

A shocking and interesting experience to say the least. So the day passed and Sarah came to pick me up at work and at this point she had decided against going bike shopping and was nice enough to still take to pick up my car. I get to the U-haul and it was sitting out front and all complete. The hitch looked great and you could barely see it. I went in an paid and left to go to the bike shop to buy my bike rack so that I could use my hitch.

The bike rack was purchased and I really wanted to get my car washed it had rained this week and was quite dirty. See if you don't know I sold my Red truck in Janruary and purchased a 2006 Infiniti G35. It was a slate blue 4 door car. It was a wonderful car and I couldn't have been more pleased with it.

On my way to the car wash Patrick sent me a message asking this one question " Car OK?" I responded " Yeah its great the hitch is on and you can barely see it"

No less than one minute later I approached a green light and had to turn left on green. Everyone has done this 1000 times before. I pulled up to control the intersection and there was another car attempting to turn left who was facing me. I looked and carefully examined the situation and saw and opening between cars to go. So I stepped on the gas to pass through the intersection and what I failed to see was a 2007 VW Rabbit. I immediately slammed on the brakes and turned the wheel all the way to the left in hopes to correct my position some more that I wouldn't hit him. My effort was worthless. For those of you that have been in a car as the driver in an accident there is a moment when you are in the car that you almost feel that the car that you have been controlling is no longer in your control. No matter how hard you press the brakes or turn the wheel you cannot change what is about to happen. At this moment I take my hands off of the wheel and relax my arms and watch as my car collides with the VW Rabbit. I sit in my car and wait for our all of our kinetic energy of my car and the other individuals cars to come to a rest. During the course of this crash, my airbag deployed and there is a smell in the car of cap guns or firecrackers. This is from the explosive reaction that is required to expel the airbag at such a velocity to protect the passanger from injury. I however, was wearing my seatbelt and didn't move an inch in the car. This is the second bad accident I have been in, in which the seatbelt has thourghly protected me.

My first reaction after the cars come to a stop is to turn off the car and get out. I get out and immediately ask the other individual if he is okay. He indeed is okay. I then tell him to turn off his car as well. We then both get out and begin to inspect the damage. I immediatly apologize and say tell him it was my fault, because it indeed was. A bystander had already called the police so I begin the process of getting on the phone with my insurance company, and taking his information. This is a long drawn out process and it takes some time. The Police officer writes up the statement and both myself and the other individual are in agreement with his assessment of the situation. At this point the officer indicates that he will not be citing me for any violations of any sort. This was nice, because it may help the long road of my increased insurance premiums be a little less.

As we begin to part ways and watch the tow truck driver load my vehicle a individual begins walking towards me and hands me a card. He introduces himself as Ken. Ken is an employee of Sewell. Sewell is a company that owns numerous car dealerships throughout Dallas. I in fact bought my car at Sewell Infiniti. Ken said he saw this on my licsence plate frame and wanted to see if he could help me in any way. He offered a ride and I gladly accepted. He said just let me call my wife and we can leave. I wrapped things up at the scene and left with Ken.

This is when things got a little weird. Previously when Ken handed me his card I noticed that he was a LEED AP. I too am a LEED Accredited Professional. For those of you that don't know "LEED" stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. Its Green Building and sustanability. So I begin some small talk and ask him what he does for Sewell. This is where he indicates that he is the Faclilites Manager and in charge of new construction. This is very interesting to me since, my company Turner is working with them on building a few of their upcoming buidlings. We shared talk on Turner and Green Building, and it was nice to hear from one of our clients the things he likes about Turner. I will be sure to share them with the people I work with on Monday. Ken ended up taking me to the collosion center and back to my apartment. It is amazing that Sewell employees have that kind of dedication to their customers, especially since there was nothing in it for him. It was a selfless act of compassion. I have already written Ken a hand written thankyou note and will also write one on behalf of Turner Logistics to their entire company.

So my weekend didn't start like I had planned. But it happend, so I tried to just be happy that I was alive and could see another day. It was weird how intertwined everything was with the G35 being wrecked that morning, having Patrick ask how my car was, all the way to meeting a Client of Turner Construction. Its a small world. So keep scrolling and you can see the pictures. If you get this in your email you may not see the pictures Just go to this website.

So on Sunday I woke up at 5:30 so I could go volunteer for a Half Ironman race here in dallas. It was a great experience. I got to be at the bottle hand offs on the bike route. This is a fun thing to do. You basically have to hand off bottles to the riders as they are riding by. Some are going really fast too, so you have to run along side them. It was truly nice to see how appreciative everyone is of the volunteers, I mean in every race I do I thank them all the time. I realized in my Half Ironman that without the volunteers at these races they wouldn't happen and no one could ever race. I am going to try to volunteer as much as possible for events that I am not racing in.

Sometimes in the spring time we.....

2008-04-09T12:02:00.002-05:00

So I had to travel for work on Monday afternoon, for one night to Atlanta, GA. I went there for a class called "Dealing with Difficult People". It was a very informative class and I left with some good pointers. It was also nice to hear that people from all across the country in all Turner offices are dealing with the same thing. I sometimes thing my job title should be a Dealing with difficult people engineer. What was the most interesting is when we shared stories on how to deal with various difficult situtations and what works and doesn't.

What I hate the most about traveling for work is that most of the time it really screws up my eating schedule. I hate it because when I am in Dallas all week, Mon - Fri, I plan out my meals on sunday and go to the grocery store and buy fresh ingredients to eat. When I have to travel for work, if I go and buy fresh food it usually goes to waste since I am not at home for a few days. It just throws a wrench in my eating. However, also when I travel there are too many temptations for me and I usually give in to eating some sweets or a treat here and there. Because when I am at home I eat really healthy food, a treat every so often never hurt anybody.

Back to the training. I had a good recovery and feel normal after my Half Ironman (HIM). I did a 30 mi bike ride called Tour Dallas on saturday, it was a nice easy slow ride. I also had an unexpected 1200m swim on friday afternoon with Tommy and Mike. This was good, but I could tell my shoulders were still sore from the HIM. Its funny, because it wasn't the swimming 1.2 miles in the race that made my shoulder and back sore it was the combination of running 13.1 and biking 56mi. Believe it or not these activities use your Latissimus Dorsi, Trapezius, and all 3 deltoids more than you think. I mean after my full marathon, my shoulders were tighter than Dick's hat band. They were sore. Its just the running and moving your shoulders back and forth for almost 4 hours that can really take a toll on the body. This is why it is important for triathletes to have some type of strength training in the offseason to help with preventing injury, etc. etc. I began yesterday on the plan to figure out my workout schedule for April, May, and June. This is in preparation for Buffalo Springs Ironman 70.3 I have really tried to make the best of all the traveling that I will be doing for work during the month of April and June. Some of my plans include running hills while I am in NY in April and doing some OWS when I am in Long Beach, CA in June. I actually am really looking forward to these workouts since it will really break up the routine, while providing some great training for the race.

So today I had a 5mi run and it was nice. As I went outside to run, I have begun to see the changes to the foliage and many of the small changes that occur as the seasons turn. I ran at the same time on Monday and it felt like it was already getting brighter out early. The trees a more green and the weather is warm and refreshing. I have never realized that this year I am much more dependent on the changing seasons for my training. I feel like I have an acute sense of the change of the seasons this year as opposed to any other year in my life. In many years past I never remeber feeling such an invigorating sense of opportunity and desire to train outside. It is almost as if as the winter turns to spring, my body is turning from a swimmer, cyclist, and runner, to a triathlete. I feel very optimistic about this summer and spring training and that good things will happen. What is key is proper recovery and making sure I listen to my body and don't get over zealous and try to take on too much to quick. This is why I think its going to be good to take 2 weekends off in April from training and just relax.

The key to a successful triathlon season is finding a good balance between, training, friends and family, fun outside of triathlon sports, and work.

So I will try to post my work out schedules in some fashion for all too see, but don't know how yet.

Going half way home.....

2008-04-02T16:17:00.004-05:00

So this is the post that will sum up my race experience throughout my first Half Ironman Distance Race. I competed in the Lonestar Half Ironman, in Galveston Texas on March 30, 2008. I think the best way to do this is kind of like a favorite author of mine, Tucker Maxx. I will put it into time and date stamps and write a piece about each significant time of the entire weekend. After which I will comment on the experience as a whole.

Thursday 3.27.08

3:15pm - I left Dallas all packed up hoping that I hadn't forgotten anything. I had a partner with me for the ride and was curious to learn a little bit about who he was, and what his story was. He was another member of the Team In Training Team. His name was Jack.

6:50pm - I arrived in Houston at the hotel where I lived for almost 2 months. It was a weird feeling. As usual all of the business travelers looked at me like I am some kind of nut wheeling a bicycle into the hotel room but I don't care. They are the fat fucks who are simply sitting around getting more fat talking about how they should loose weight but not doing anything about it. To make a long story short Jack was a great guy and I was really excited for him. He was getting ready to do his first triathlon this weekend and was very nervous. I tried to give him all the advice I could. I reached back into my triathlon experiences and my first few were a great deal shorter than his. He was doing the Lonestar Quarter Iron, basically half of what I was doing. Some of the things I told him were this:

1. You have to simply swim .6 miles. This is about 1000m. I asked him how many times have you swam that distance in the pool? He answered quite a few. I said so what makes doing it in this race any different. Yeah, your in a wet suit, the water is a little more cold, there are others around you, but what is most important and what doesn't change is the distance. You did it once just do it again. There is no need to rush, if you get tired just do breast stroke.

2. The other thing I said was you have done 2 century rides (1oomi bike rides) you will finish this race there is no doubt in my mind.

Needless to say he finished and was really excited. His entire family was there to support him and he was so happy when he was done too. I was truly touched by him and how happy he was. It was a great site to see and to be honest there were so many people around me in the same position.

7:15pm - I got the bike put together and in spandex. I went out for a 20mi ride on the bayou trail in Houston right by my hotel. It was a wonderful evening. Then I went and ate a fat burger at a restaurant and was in bed by 9:30pm

Friday 3.28.08

5:00am - Woke up and went to my work meeting fast forward to....

3:45pm - Arrived in Galveston. There was a open water swim from 3 - 5 pm and I really wanted to make this so I rushed to get checked in the hotel. I was really excited. The hotel had signs up welcoming the triathletes and there was certain buzz about the place. I mean the first things you see are people unloading there expensive bikes, and walking them into the hotel. They are always pushing the way triathletes do. It seems like, and I do it too, that triathletes always like to push their bike by the seat and not by the handle bar stem. One would think this is more difficult but its kind of like a challenge to see how straight your bike will go and like a little game.

3:55pm - Standing in line at the checkout counter there are two guys my age almost in front talking about racing. I love to eavesdrop too. I have realized in my life that I am a competitor and I love to size people up. By no means am I a all-star triathlete but I like to compare myself to others. I know that some are better than me and that is all right by me. The beauty of triathlon is not about if you are the best its about personal improvement, achievement, and the satisfaction you get from training and racing. But hell, I still like seeing who I am better than and winning; who doesn't.

4:30pm - I make it to the dock with my wetsuit and my swimp3 and swim cap. I strap up and get loaded in. I talk with a lady coming out of the water and asks her how the water is and she says Excellent, and wonderful. I think even if the water is freezing fucking cold everyone should give her response. Cold water is only as cold as you let you mind think it is. Why do you think some people think 65 is cold and others don't. I get in for about an 800m swim and it was flawless. My first few strokes I floated and glided through the water like a hot knife through butter. I can now say that I love swimming in the salt water in a wetsuit. It was great.

I will fast forward to race day because I just realized that I will probably be here typing for like 3 hours and that would be shitty.

3/29/08

I go to dinner by myself after I pick up my packet and attend the race meeting. The whole time while I am doing all of this by myself, I have time to reflect and just get focused for tomorrow. I begin to think that I really truly have enjoyed training for this race and in particular the time I spend alone, by myself, in the pool, on the bike and running the roads. This always a time of deep introspective thought about your life. Its very meaningful to me and I enjoy it. It can be hard to explain what you are think about on a 3 hour run or bike ride but there is always something going through your head, its never just empty.

I eat alone at a Pizza restaurant. The pizza was good too. I always love to eat pizza or chipolte before a race because of my horrible experience at my first half marathon. I ate weird food the night before and had diarrhea every hour on the hour from midnight to 5am. It was a hard race. Thanks to sarah I was able to make it. She bought me imodium AD. So that is why I stick to pizza and normal food that I know my body can handle.

I get back to the Hotel at about 8:00pm. I get into some comfortable clothes and want to watch my What It Takes DVD. I put it in my work computer only to find out it doesn't play DVD's. Needless to say I got that fixed this past week. So I end up going to bed at about 8:30pm. Right before that another TNT team mate who I am sharing my room with comes in. I wish him luck and I say I am going to bed.

Sunday 3/30/08

4:30 am -- I wake up from my wake up call. This is when the routine begins. One key thing about racing in endurance sports and especially triathlons, is that alot of things can go wrong on race day. Think about this, I will be doing an event that lasts close to 6 hours. I will have 3 different events which I will compete in and all of these 3 events have there own accessories. You could have your goggles break, bike break, sunglasses break, shoes break, etc. etc. You could have stomach problems or multitudes of other things go wrong. So my motto is:

Stay In Control, But Never Forget What You Control....

What I am trying to say by this is that don't let things outside of your control upset you and get you down, and also don't be a victim to something that you could have prevented. This is why I have my routine.

My routine is like this any race I do its the same. When its starts to go awry I get worried....

1. Wake up, shower.

2. Shave

3. Put on Comfortable clothes.

4. Make Breakfast. I always try to eat breakfast about 2 hours before the race. The reason for this is that I have learned how my body processes food and that I need time for it to really settle and sometimes an hour isn't enough. Eating breakfast causes that gastro intestinal reflex and makes ya shit to be blunt. You don't want to have to do this during a race so, to get it all out I make sure I eat well before the race, and I eat the same thing I do on almost every training day. I eat a cliff bar, instant oatmeal, and a banana. Sometimes I will add in some peanut butter and wheat toast.

5. Drink water and gatorade.

6. Go through all of the stuff I layed out the night before that I am going to need for the race. I pack the night before so that I can check it off again the morning of and will not be in a rush and forget something. This is another reason I wake up so long before the race. I mean the race didn't start until 7:45 and transition didn't close till 7:30am. Being rushed on race morning is a horrible thing and should be avoided at all costs. One bad outcome of being rushed is obvious, the other not so much. Sure you may forget something important, but chances are you will get it and only be delayed in arriving. What would affect me the most is the mental effect of being hurried. The long distance triathlon is such a mental game that when you are rushed in the morning it puts you in a agitated state and hurried state. For me this is negative. I preform better when I am calm and resolved. I want to feel the nervousness throughout my body.

7. The routine is now done off to the race.

Arrive at transition at 5:45am. I go to get my body marking done. I forgot to heed the comments in the race packet and put on my sun screen before they marked me. Needless to say my numbers rubbed right off. The whole time walking to transition I was listening to the music I listen to when I train. This helps to put me in the right frame of mind. I listen to weird music but it helps bring the memories back of training all the time. I rack my bike and set up transition as always.

I then take a walk to the swim exit and follow the path all the way back to where my bike is racked at. I note the row I am in Letter B, and the best path to go. This is important to make sure your not lost when you get out of the water. I can tend to be in a daze after I swim hard for a long distance and then start to run. If triathlons were swim, run, bike, I think a bunch of people would fall over, I stumble around when I get out of the water sometimes.

So I am all set up and waiting for the race to start. Its only about 6:30am. I have more than an hour just to relax and think about the race ahead. Not in a rush, hurry or anything, this is a good feeling.

7:15am I walk out of transition and towards the dock. The swim course begins to come into sight and take shape. All I think is Damn thats Far. Open water swim courses always look so much farther in person than compared to when you actually swim them. We have another pre-race meeting for 5 min and I am ready to go. I am in the 3rd wave. Its starts with Green Caps, Blue Caps, and then me Yellow caps.

7:40am they let the yellow caps hop in the water and tread for 5min till the start. Luckily I am wearing a wetsuit and don't even have to tread. I just float. So I wait a minute or 2 then jump in at about 7:43am. As soon as I get in, I piss myself. This couldn't had been better timing. I had been holding it until I got in the water. See the thing about a wetsuit is that it is supposed to let some water in but not back out and the warmth of your body in turn raises the temperature of the water and provides like an extra warm water blanket that surrounds you. They are great. My water however I didn't let in on my own, it was 98.6 degree urine with a bit of salt water. Say what you want, I was fucking warm.

7:45 am - The gun sounds and I was at the front of my swim group. They let each group go 5 min between each other. The Green caps started at 7:35, Blue caps at 7:40 and then us. I just start swimming knowing that I will be swimming non stop for 1.2 miles, in lightly choppy salt water that was about 67 degrees. I was doing my sighting about every 3 breaths or every 9 - 10 strokes. I swim pretty straight in calm water so I don't sight much if its calm. I get to the first buoy, and start my turn. I pop my head up and see a few blue and green swim caps around me. This gets me pumped up. I was feeling really good and strong. I had covered almost at least 10min of ground on some people. After this site I feel into a rhythm and just kept trying to pass people or find someone at my pace.

I finish the swim and exit the water. There are wet suit strippers there for us and I plop on the ground and they pull on the arms of the suit and off it comes like sheath off of a knife, fast, slick and smooth.

I run to my bike throw on my socks, bike shoes helmet, race belt and glasses. Then I realize the sun isn't even out so I throw them back down. This could have been a crucial error but I gambled and the gamble paid off The sun never came out until the run. I am out of the T1 in longer than I would like but no worries.

I begin the bike ride and I am hauling ass over 20mph. I felt strong and began to just drink my fluids and figure out what times I was going to eat my food. I ate a gel immediately when I got on the bike, then I figured about 50min later I would have my cliff bar then another 50min I would have my gel, all the while drinking gatorade and water. I made sure that at each bottle hand off I took a bottle in.

Well, I drank alot of fluid. So much that I had to stop and pee 3 times. Every time I had to pee, I tried so hard to stand up out of the saddle and piss myself and I don't know what the problem was but I just couldn't go. I don't know if its the pressure from the saddle on your but that transfers to your bladder or what. I mean how many times can you say all you wanted to do was piss yourself and you can't. I mean most people have the exact opposite problem. So I will just have to practice it sometime. I mean practice makes perfect. So stopping 3 times to pee didn't help my time at all. The first of the 2 - 28 mile loops was lonely, cold, and foggy. It was all the lead guys and not many people in front of me. At one point I felt all alone and it was quite. All I could hear was the humming of the sinusoidal wave of the high voltage lines running above my head along side the highway. It was all too eery. The second loop was much more fun. I mean I rode about 21 mph the entire time and passed tons of people from all the previous waves. Way more things to look at.

Now on to the run, I had a quick T2 transition and was off. I realized on the bike at about mile 45 or 50 that I should have ate more on the bike. I was hungry. Next time I will bring another cliff bar and 2 more gels. So first thing I do is pop a double espresso gel and have a water on the run. I start off a good pace and hoping just for an under 2hr half marathon. I just let my body fall in a groove. I drank and ate at the aid stations. I forgot how many more gels I had but it at least was like 3 more. I had some handfuls of pretzels a few times too. I felt good the entire run. No weird pains, or side stitches. This was a positive thing. What wasn't was the run course itself. It was a 2 - 6.5 mile loops. I hate loops in races. I run the same route all the time at home but in a race I just want to run one and be done. The run was nice scenery though. After mile 10 is when I begin to get bored. I wasn't tired, I wasn't sore, I wasn't in pain. I was just bored of running. What I wanted was my music. I really enjoy my music and it makes the miles tick away when I am running. If I would have had my music I could have probably ran another 6.5 mile loop. So I think in preparation for other races I need to do some of my long runs without the tunes. This will help to aid in this boredom. So at mile 11, I begin to chant, or say some sort of mantra. At this point I had to go to one more turn around and then the rest of the way was back to the finish line. I was chanting something along the lines of " Why Not Now!" It fell in real good sink with my breathing and just was kind of fun to chant it out loud. All the entire time anyone I saw wearing a white bib which signified the Half Ironman who was walking I shouted encouragement to them. I said things like don't quit now, and you can do it, simply its easier when you smile.

One prevailing thought through my head the entire time I was racing was how I thought in August 2007 that a Half Ironman was out of my reach. I remember on a 10mi run at 4:30am in October 2007 I realized how easy and fluid 10 mi runs had became to me. This is when I said to myself, I am going to sign up and run a half Ironman. So 6 months later I did, and I crossed the finish line felt good. The whole time I was training for it all I would ever do was visualize myself walking across the finish line hands in the air with a giant clock ticking above my head, red timing mats beneath my battered running shoes and a smile upon my face. This image became my reality on March 30th 2008. There are few things that you can think about and imagine for nearly 6 months that actually come true. How many times in your life has this happened to you? And if your lucky enough that you have imagined something for a long time then it comes true, then how many of those times have you and only your efforts been the cause of that visualization and image becoming a reality. This is why I love triathlons. I can do anything I want.

So My final splits are:

1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike ride, 13.1 mile run

Total Overall Time - 5:18:52

1.2 mile swim - 36:45

1:54 per 100m

Transition #1 - 3:01

56 mile bike ride - 2:45:18

Average speed 20.3 mph

Transition #2 - 1:16

13.1 mile run - 1:52:31

8:35 per mile pace

Thats it folks, and BTW it is way easier than a marathon. I felt great the next day. Whens the next one. I love this distance.

Birthday Presents are even better when you buy them for yourself

2008-03-25T21:48:00.003-05:00

So my birthday is right around the corner and I needed to buy some new things too. For quite sometime I have been wanting to get a new watch. For the past 6 or 7 years I have been wearing 20 or 30 dollar watches, and they have held up decently but, they aren't that nice. The way I feel about a watch is that it should be nice. I see a watch as not just a time piece but as part of your wardrobe just as shoes or a shirt. A nice watch says a great deal about the person wearing it. However that is not to say that you need to spend a ton of money on one either. The watch I had was about 2 years old and I paid 28 dollars for it. I could say I got my moneys worth. If you have never held an expensive watch or wear one, just go into a store and pick one up and you will realize the difference between my 28 dollar timex and a more expensive watch. So I went shopping last night and bought myself some birthday presents with my tax return.

I shopped around at 3 different well know jewelers in dallas and got a great deal on a TAG Heuer Automatic Aquaracer. It is really nice watch and I plan to keep it for many years to come. It has the black face and I am really pleased with it.

I also needed new sunglasses since the pair I have had for the past 3 years finally bit the dust. I think I may have had to much fun on St. Patricks day because ever since they were bent and when I bent them back the metal hinge almost broke. So I got another 2 weeks out of them almost.. So it just so happened that about 2 weeks ago I got a gift certificate in the mail from the sunglass hut for 20 dollars off as a present for my birthday. So I decided to go use it. I went in an looked around and wanted a different pair of glasses. I had a pair of tortise shell ray-bans for the past 3 years and wanted to change it up. So one pair stuck out and I think they look great. I ended up buying a pair of Prada sunglasses. They weren't cheap but hell either is a pair of 200 dollar ray-bans or something else. What I like about them is that they are very different and unique from most other guys glasses that I know. I like them quite a bit. So that was my birthday presents. I also ended up paying 500 plus dollars for my ticket to madison for the half marathon with laura in may. It sucks what 2 weeks difference will make on airline fares. O-well.

Workout wise today I had 5mi run at a super slow pace this morning. I almost ran at a 9min/mile pace. I haven't ran that slow in years it was quite peaceful too. After that I came in and did about 25min of yoga. I always DVR this show called Namaste Yoga on FIT-TV channel and do those. Its nice because I always have about 5 episodes on my DVR and I can do them whenever I want and they are always different routines.

Today I had to go out to a jobsite for work and what I thought would be about 2hrs time spent there ended up in 6hrs. I didn't get home until 6:45 and was going to just eat dinner and relax, but as I walked up the past the shitty ass work out facility in our apartment I saw 2 people working out and said to myself is why would anyone ever torture themseleves by spending time inside when they could go outside and run. Then I get to my apartment and look out the window and see tons of people running, and biking by on the Katy Trail in a slowly setting sun with a warm breeze blowing the leaves on the tree, that makes one reminesce of my mispent youth running around Glendale, Ohio. When I saw that seen and thought of 2 people stuck in the basement of an apartment complex in a former laundry room on an elliptical machine, and I said I have to get out there on my bike and ride. So I went out and rode around for 47mins.

One thing I practiced a bunch was my Transition 1's and 2's for my sprint races. I practiced leaving my shoes on my bike and jumping on it and strapping in and begininng to pedal. I also practiced leaving my shoes on the bike and taking my feet out and pedaling with my feet on top of my shoes and hopping off barefoot. I really messed up one time and fell on the top tube of my bike. It was not a plesant feeling for the little boys. But you gotta learn somehow right? What I was trying to learn and eventually got the hang of was these links : and

So check them out and that is what I practiced today. It was a good day for me long but good. Tomorrow I have to pack all my stuff for the race and go to this stupid training for work from 4-6pm. I don't think I will swim tomorrow am but try to get in a good bike ride in tomorrow night. At worst case I will swim tomorrow pm.

When you write a goal down on paper its always there to remind you!

2008-03-23T21:24:00.006-05:00

Well I had a little too much fun last night out with friends. I won't write about for the world to hear but if you are interested let me know. It has made today a little rough.

Today I went for a 2 hour bike ride which was very slow and casual. We rode all over Dallas and saw many of the sites in the city. It was nice and got me thinking about how the Tour of Dallas I am doing the weekend after my race will be really cool.

I really just wanted to write in about my goal. I cut out of the last Triathlon magazine a clipping of the Ironman Wisconsin race bio. I hung it on my wall and wrote 2009 on it. This is the goal. In the year 2009 I will begin the one of the largest undertakings in my entire life. I will after completing the Ironman 70.3 race in Austin, Texas take a break and figure out my plan for racing the Ironman Wisconsin race. The race will be in September 2009. It is now a going to become a reality. Its just a matter of time.

About 2 years ago I began my first training program ever. I got on runners world and downloaded a half marathon training plan. I did this for one reason, and there is one person to thank. That person is Fernando Rodriguez. Fernando was my boss at Turner Universal when I first started working in Janruary 2004. I had another opportunity to work with him in the summer of 2006 at Turner. He is a great mentor and a positive person who I have learned a great deal from over the years. I really look up to him in many ways. He is one of the people that I was sad that I left behind when I transferred to Dallas. I throughly enjoyed working with him. Anyways thats who Fernando is. When I told him about how much I was running and how I had done some 5k's recently he said simply, that I should train for a half marathon. Plain and simple he is one of the reasons that I am where I am today. He put it simply, just get a plan and stick to it and the training does the rest. From what I can recall, from that day forward I began to research what Half marathons I could race in and where I could get guidance on a training plan. I found what I needed in Runners world magazine and there online website. I set the goal of training for The St. Judes Half marathon in memphis in December 2006. I started my training when I went back to school and one thing I did was print it out and post it on my wall. I crossed off each day that I had a workout and looked at it everyday. I also wrote the date of the race on it as a constant reminder.

What I am trying to convey is how your goals, dreams, and aspirations can always be attained and achieved no matter how lofty. I put reminders of these goals on display for me to see everyday. I look at them a thousand times a day. I stare at them thinking, hoping, and dreaming of what will come. Not only are they there for me to see but everybody that comes in my apartment sees them as well. This is a great way for me to share my dreams with friends. It helps to keep me accountable for what I am trying to achieve because every time someone asks me what they are I tell them. This simple act of printing the race registration or in my case putting the ad's and articles about the races I am running in from Triathlete magazine on the wall will help me to make my dreams reality. This little trick works too. I encourage anyone to try it for anything at all. A fellow person on runnersworld traithlon forum has a quote that sums up this topic.

You can quit and sure nobody else cares, but you'll always know you quit.

It was a good friday wasn't it????

2008-03-21T10:43:00.002-05:00

Oh how it has been a good friday. I slept in an was rested but a little groggy, I didn't go to bed until 3:30 and woke up at 8:30. The week went well as I wrote about on monday. I still am dissapointed because I have not yet received my DVD what it takes yet.. I got 2-3 priority mail and here it is friday 5 days after I ordered it and it still hasn't shown up. Damn mail system. I hate the USPS system, and much prefer UPS or Fedex.

Today we planned to go for a 50mi ride on the bikes. Tommy, Mike, and myself found a route on the internet and we packed up the car and rode down south to Waxahachie, its about 35 or 40 miles south of dallas and started our ride. It could not have been a better day for it too. The sun was shining about 75 degrees and hardly a cloud in the sky. At numerous points during the ride I realized that I much more enjoy riding the country like that with limited cars and minimal stops. It was great. I have this feeling that we will be doing this much more often in the future.

The only complaints were the road was quite rough at times and the wind was harsh. However this isn't really a complaint because it only prepares me for race day because you will never know what you are gonna get come race morning, but its key to be in control of the things that "YOU" are in control of. One of those is being training in conditions like today so if thats what your given you can pull back to those memories of easter weekend and riding 50 mi in rough winds and bumpy roads. This is when I will tell myself, you did it then so lets do it this time... Its funny how your mind and heart take you across the finish line and not your legs or your arms.

In closing I am only 9 days away from my first Half Ironman and couldn't be more thrilled. I did this with Team In Training and didn't really ever even train with them, but I raised the money more than expected too. I was sent an email from a coach and I will post a little something that they wrote. I enjoyed reading it so maybe you will too.

The time is drawing near for you to put aside your fear. We all were once in the same boat thinking "Will I sink or will I float?, Will my legs really spin pedaling into the wind? Will I take a big spill going up that big hill? Will I run to the finish? Will my strength be diminished? Will I suffer defeat or become a better triathlete?

But all of us, we made it, through the water, and on the pavement, ....... So when you see that big banner, when you see that big clock, fall back on your training and relish in it because it will be something that you never forget....

Short on Work, Long on Training

2008-03-17T20:17:00.003-05:00

This one is going to be short but something is better than nothing. My workouts were great today. I had a 2800m swim this morning and then a 21 mile ride this evening in which I averaged 19.4 mph. I was hauling ass down the Katy trail.... it was great! This week will prove to be a great week for a couple reasons.

1. I ordered the movie "What It Takes" on Sunday. I got both the Trainer Edition and the Standard edition. I am so excited about watching this I can't even begin to explain. I am so excited in fact that I am considering setting up my TV outside and riding on my trainer when I get it. I have a feeling that I will watch both of these movies on a regular basis and they will serve as inspiration when the training begins to get tough.

Time for a tangent.... A recent post on runnersworld triathlon forum, was what type of motivating things should you say to a person competing in an ironman while you are a volunteer. A few Ironman finishers posted their comments. However, there was one that stood out among all the rest. This comment really helps to paint the picture of why I want to complete one of these races. The comment was simple, short and sweet, it was: "Your going to be an Ironman" If someone to say that to me at mile 14 or 18 of the 26.2 run, I would feel re-invigorated and that special thought would come back into my head as to why I am doing what I am doing. To me completing an Ironman is 10+ hours of grueling, punishing, but yet satisfying work, that once completed, I will own the bragging rights of being an Ironman for a lifetime. Just watch the videos and you'll see what I mean. Here are some cool videos Ironman and Ironman 2 and Ironman 3

Anyways...

2. I don't have to work on Friday another great thing...

3. Friday is a free day to get in some great training. I am planning on going somewhere far off in the country and going for like a 60-70 mile ride on the bike. Slow and easy but fun...

4. Saturday is an open water swim at lake grapevine. I can't wait for this. I get to wear my wetsuit in the open water. I love the challenge of swimming in the open water. I want to do about 2000-3000 meters or around 1 - 2 hours of swimming. Then go maybe get to know some of my Team In Training Team mates a little better.

5. Mike is having people over tomorrow night for a cookout so that will be fun.

6. Wednesday night I am cooking a swordfish recipe from the latest issue of Men's Health, it should be a good meal too. I think I will have grilled asparagus too.

If all of these reasons don't make this into a good week, I don't know what will... So a short posting, I guess not..

I will be sending my blog out to a distribution list of my close family and friends.... If you would like to be added to this list please email me at bskyllingstad@gmail.com

Have a good night...

2008-03-16T12:13:00.003-05:00

Well here are the results:

St. Patricks Day Triathlon Results

I didn't place in my age group but ended up getting 7th. I was pleased with this performance. My computer told me I averaged over 20.7 mph on the 12 mile bike leg. I was able to hit a 4:57 in my swim but its probably closer to a 4:40 in the swim because I had to wait to get out of the pool and run a bit before I got to the mat for the timing chip. The swim was 300 meters so I averaged about 1:31 per 100 meters. The run was weak, I could have gone faster but for the first mile I had a side stitch that I couldn't shake because my nose was stuffed up and couldn't take deep breathes. Normally when I get a side stitch I take deep breaths breathing from your stomach in through my nose and out through my mouth. What I mean by breathing from my stomach is imagine and try wen you take a deep breath let you stomach be pushed out and not sucked in. Its a technique that I learned in yoga. By breathing like this when you have a side stitch it helps to relax your diaphragm and alleviate the side stitch quickly. I normally can get ride of a side stitch before it even starts. I realized my description of breathing through your stomach isn't very good so here is a link. Belly Breathing

Besides not getting a medal I was very happy with my performance. When you compare results to last year there was a bunch more competition in the race. My time from this year would have put me in the top 3 in my age group when compared to the results from last year.

Yesterday ended up being one drunken day too. We went to Greenville Ave. for the block party they had and a few houses too. It was good time, and needless to say I ended up in bed at 11:30pm. But that is a long day after waking up at 4am. So now I am gonna go for an easy ride on the bike.

2008-03-15T04:50:00.003-05:00

"Those who gossip with you will gossip of you."

"You'll never plow a field by turning it over in your mind."

"Your feet will bring you to where your heart is."

"Praise the young and they will blossom."

"A silent voice is music to the ears."
-Irish Proverbs

I'm a drinker with a writing problem.
-Brendan Behan

And...

"I spent 90% of my money on women and drink. The rest I wasted."
-George Best

How many times in your life have you heard a short quote and thought it simply captures your raw feelings and emotions better than a 1000 words could ever describe. This has happened to me many times. Another one of my favorites is

Discipline is doing what you don't want to do so you can do what you really want to do....

Jeff Fischer--Tennessee Titans Head Coach

That quote has carried me through the past 2 years and 3 half marathons, 1 duathlon, numerous 10k's and 5k's, 3 sprint triathlons, 2 olympic distance tri's, and a 100km bike ride. Those 19 words can better describe my inner personal drive than I could. Today those words will take me through my 4th sprint triathlon.

As I sit here at 5am on a saturday only after going to bed at 10am on a Friday night, which by the way is the earliest I have gone to bed on Friday since my last saturday morning race many a moons ago. I pondered many things before I went to bed last night. I am a big advocate of visualisation and actively imagining each step and movement of a race. While I am thinking of the process I am constantly reminding myself of the way my body is going to feel physically and mentally. I try to imagine the intensity I will be racing at and draw back on those hard mornings in the pool, long winter days on the trainer in my hotel room in Houston, where the hotel staff knew me as the "Bike Guy", and not to mention the long morning in Austin at my first marathon.

It is critical to remember the experiences and feelings your body goes through in training because those thoughts and emotions will be what takes you to the finish line, and in my honest opinion, the longer the race the more important your mental state affects how you will finish.

Have you ever asked yourself "What was Chris McCormack thinking when he hopped off his bike after riding 112 miles in the heat and humidity of Kona, HI only to strap on his shoes to run a 2:20 something marathon." www.chrismccormack.com What drives him and how do you emotionally and mentally take your body to that limit. As I sit here and write this I already know the answer for myself, and that is what is important, My answer is that he believed he could do it and nothing was going to stop him from doing it. When I believe I can do something, it's just a matter of time before I can get my body physically to the place where my mind already is.....

So didn't write much this week but I had a good week. I had good swims on monday and wednesday, a good bike on monday and thursday, my first tempo run since the marathon. This felt good. On Tuesday I did a 5mi 38min run on the katy trail, and friday was a rest day and I am racing this morning at and I hope to go out 100% and post a good time. www.stpatrickstriathlon.com I am going to leave it all out on the course and learn by failure... If I get a medal then thats great if not, I just ran a race with 2 good friends and am already looking forward to the next. Its gonna be nice to sit around afterwards with friends and talk about what we each learned and struggled with at the race.

Well off for now and I am already getting the butterflys, but that is good thing to me, if you don't have those then your not nervous and if your not nervous then your mind has been put in a place where what ever you are about to do doesn't really have much meaning to you. I mean think about why do you get nervous? I get nervous because I am concerned about performing well in the race. But what does that really mean? It means that this race is really important to me and that no matter what time I post its a big thing in my life that has significant meaning in my life. Fail or succeed, to not be nervous or anxious or what ever you want to call it before a big event in my eyes means you don't care two shits about the event or presentation or what ever it may be.

So many races so little time

2008-03-09T13:27:00.005-05:00

Good afternoon, I just got done registering for a 90 mile ride from Austin Texas, to Shiner, Texas to take a tour of the Shiner Bock brewery and drink lots of beer. My friend Mike and Tommy will be doing the ride too. This will be the farthest I have ever ridden too. Its going to be a great practice for Buffalo Springs 70.3 which is a really hilly bike course and will be tough. That is on June 29th and the Shiner Ride is on May 3rd. I already can't wait. I am doing so many cool races this year. I love Texas and all of the races that you can do here.

Yesterday, I did about a 30mi ride followed by a 10mi bike ride. I felt quite strong the entire time i was doing it. It was a good practice before my first half ironman (HIM). What I have begun to realize that having run the marathon has really made me feel confident in my ability to run 13 miles. Its so easy for me know to do that distance. I could run that distance all day. The confidence I have now is superb. I kind of wish I could have ran the 10mi a bit faster but no worries, with time will come speed.

I did Yoga today for about 40 minutes, I was quite sore from yesterdays workout. This should help with that soreness.

Last night I got a call from a good friend Jen from college. It was really nice to hear from her. When I think back to my college experience, I recall many good memories. But some people and some certain experiences stand out above all others. Some of those people like, Tyler, Mike, Chris, and some memories like karaoke. That is where Jen comes into play. In college I was a bit on the hefty side and now not so much. With that being said not too many girls were ever attracted to me nor did I meet that many girls while I was in college. Jen was different and she was someone that I became great friends with. She was really like the first girl that I got to know well in college. Through her I met many of her friends and gained a great group of friends. This may sound a little weird but this didn't happen until I was a junior in college. I mean I could count the girls I knew in college on 2 hands and some of those were people I knew before I went to school. To give you an idea of how fat and how few girls I knew in college, I was never once in my 5 years at school ever invited to any sorority date party, formal or anything like that. Some may laugh when they hear that but it kinda sucked for me. Some people went to those things all the time and I never went to a single one. What is really funny is I learned how cruel girls and others can be to people when they are fat. I mean most girls would never give me the time of day when I was fat and as I began to start to loose weight more and more girls started to be nice to me and actually realize that oh this guy isn't so bad anymore now that he lost a few pounds. I think its so funny how having a better body will make more girls appeal to you, but hell I am the same way about girls. However when I was fat I never really felt like I was fat and should have paid more attention to the fact that I had to keep buying bigger pants.

Jen is a great person and truly a good friend of mine. Yesterday while I was riding my bike I thought about her and what she might be doing. The reason I thought about her was I just think about college and what some of my friends might be doing and she just happen to be one that I thought of. What was crazy was that I got a call from her last night while I was walking to a bar and it was really nice to hear from her and hear about what she was doing. Of all the people at school Jen is one that I miss hanging out with. What is great about Jen is that through me having a girlfriend and at sometimes being mean to her and I apologize for this, she is till my friend and hasn't wavered that is the mark of a good person and friend.

I feel like I am starting to get a little long winded and the day is passing away as I type so enough for now...

just checking in with George Hamilton ????

2008-03-07T18:12:00.004-06:00

2700m in the pool this morning. I truly love swimplan.com my swimming is now much more focused and I truly feel that I am going to reap the benefits of the drills and specific workouts that it gives me. Many times before in the past I would cut my workouts short or not go very hard and now, I am forced to just get out there and complete the workout it gives. I try my best to hit the times it gives me too. I like it so much that I get excited to see what it will give me when I wake up in the morning. Its like I wake up at 4:30 then go rub my little genie lamp (that is my computer on swimplan.com.) and it gives me a challenging workout.

Then I just did 26min on the trainer after work.

Here is a little insight to my training level intensity versus my race day intensity.

For my training intensity level, it goes like this... My running training for half marathons is one easy run, a week and a tempo run and my long runs 9-15 miles I run at a faster pace then my marathon long training. I would say 70-80% Come race day, I have learned this, There is only one way to find out what you truly have inside and that is fail. I failed in my last half marathon in the sense that I tried to pick up the tempo at mile 12 and I ran a 6:30 mile and I couldn't hold that pace through mile 13. While I didn't fail in the overall finish time I failed in maintaining that pace.

For triathlons, I go about 60-70% in the swim and then I try to go all out 100% on the bike and tell myself that I will deal with what the run gives me. My last olympic tri I went all out on the bike had a PR for that leg then also had a PR on the run. And thats why I am going for th e half iron now.

I expect to fail in my first HIM in the sense I will learn my current limit and be able to evaluate what I did training wise and how it paid off.

Tonight is a barbie and ken party with friends and I plan to go and have some fun. The goal of the night is not to get drunk so I can have a good workout tomorrow. The weather is going to be cool so I was thinking of just waiting till the afternoon and doing it then. I am planning a 30 mi ride and a 10mi run. I must make the committment to it now. This will be the big practice before my half ironman.

I sent in my application to become a Mentor for team in training the other day, and they received it today. It should be interesting to do that. It is really going to take a good time commitment from me. I will for sure have to rearrange my schedule to accomodate the workouts with the team. I really want to get involved and help motivate these first time triathletes. It can be hard for me to describe how passionate about the sport of triathlon and seeing other people become involved with it. This sport truly can touch your life and change it for the better. I have seen many people who it has done this to. Hopefully I can be a part of this process for other people.