Random things

It has been awhile since I posted on my blog, but work and training for this 140.6 race that is happening in less than 2 weeks has been time consuming.

I wish all was well, but I will be a bit dinged going into the race. As I can tell, I pinched a muscle in my "ASS" or maybe my sciatic nerve. I must tell you this is not fun, hurts when I walk or even try to run, but seems to be okay or more tolerable when I swim or bike. But what can I do, I'm not going to cry about it, okay maybe a little bit. Just do some non-impact simulated running workouts and see what happens on race day.

Other random things happened, my kid is now a year older. Actually learned how to ride a two wheeled bike. I must say that is one of the most nerve racking things I have witnessed in a long time.
But she finally is getting the hang of it and trying to be speed a demon these day. Hmm, they do have track cycling for women in the Olympics!

Other random thoughts is that I received a cool set of product freebies from sof sole. They make over the counter orthopedic soles, socks, and some other fun things. I'm actually not a big Orthotic wearer, even thou I have been prescribed some custom ones by my doctor. I do think strengthening your foot by wearing a minimal shoe, running barefoot, and crazy stuff like that is the best medicine for preventing future injuries. But I know I needed a little bit of something, and these seemed to do the trick. They worked well and gave me the extra support I needed (and NO these where not the cause of my current injury) . The heat molded pair was interesting to configure but hugged my foot well and gave me the additional support as well. So a thumbs up to the SofSole products, and look forward to wearing them in the future during my races. Now if it can also fix up my "ASS" injury as well, I would be a totally happy man, but for now I will settle for the soles to help me with my chronic ankle tendentious.

So for now that is all the randomness I can think off. In a week or two I will be posting my future racing plans for 2009. Maybe not as grand as this year, but will be an adventure, because there is no other option to live your life. I think so anyways. Don't you agree?

My last Minute Brick Workout.

I was debating to sign up for the this last minute Brick workout all week long. It was close to the house and they gave out a tie-dyed race shirt. So I signed up for it, The Bangs Lake Olympic triathlon.

A new race in the Chicagoland area and why not give it a try. I have not done a Olympic Triathlon in about 3 years, so I just planned to use it to get some racing in before my 140.6 Triathlon Race.

I knew I still need to be focused on the later race, so I decided to goof off from work and rode 5 hours/82 miles on Friday. A open water swim on Saturday and Olympic race on Sunday.

So I was not sure how the race would really go for me.

I woke up for a short 45 minute drive to the race sight. I had some doubts about finding the area because of some kind of pissing contest, another Olympic race was starting in the same area. So confusing trying to find the correct race site.

Race:

I was in the second wave, 40 and up. Once we started we took a sharp turn swimming right into the sun. Total crap, I could not see to far ahead and just tried to find the rest of the bobbing heads out there. The turn buoy was about a half mile out, so not to much to guide off the entire swim. Not sure if I was swimming straight, most of the time just wondering if I was going the right way. Alot of people complained about the swim after the race, not enough buoys, yada, yada, yada, but my swim time was 38:15, so anything under 40 minutes is good enough for me.

T1 was 1:38, uneventful except I was still wet from the swim because I could not mount the bike and was not looking pretty sliding on my bike trying to clip in.

The bike was going to be interesting, I forgot my Garmin 305 at home, so I had no cadence, heart rate, or any type of GPS tech stuff to track my progress. What the hell, just pedal until it hurts and then back off and then repeat. The race website said it was a tough bike route, but how can it be? well I guess I found out, it was pretty much a two loop roller hill fest. Nothing steep by some standards, but by Chicago standards, we call it a hill. I actually felt pretty good on the bike, felt really weird jut riding a 40k, but I liked it. I finished in 1:14:43, a 20 mph avg, dang good for me, especially after riding 82 miles on Friday.

T2 was 1:27, not to bad, how do people go under 1:00, how can you do that?

The run, here comes the test to see if I'm fatigued or not. I started out well, no cramping at all, something I have problems at the half IM races. There was some rollers on the run course as well, but I was chugging along at a descent pace. Still with no gadget to track my progress, I had no idea how fast I was going, but I was passing people, so that was a good thing. Final run time, a shocker to me, 46:49, a 7:33 pace, definitely a PR, woohoo...

So total time was 2:42:50, not to bad, might be a PR, I think so? but the most important thing is that I had a good day. I think I'm liking these shorter races. Hmm, might have to add one or two Olympics Tri's in the 2009 schedule.

For a brand new event, there was some things they need to tweak, but overall, a good race. The site of the other Olympic going on the same time, with the racers on the other side of the street going the opposite direction on the bike was definitely a interesting experience. Dueling triathlons, they going to have to fix the squabble among who is going to have a race that day.

But I got some cool goodies from the race; a race hat, Tri gear bag, and of course a Tie-dyed race shirt, with tunes of Jerry Garcia playing in the background after the race. Gotta luv it.

Never Enough Sugar?

I have had these two boxes in my fridge for the past week. One containing a cheese danish the size of a pizza and the other one contained my leftover birthday cake.

I do have a really bad neurotic vice (besides my endurance racing one), I don't like seeing any food go to waste. So as of today, one box is empty, part of the cake is still left. Yes, I have eaten about 95% of both boxes.

Then washing it down with 99 cent Arizona Ice teas, I think they have about 34 grams of sugar in one can. So is to much sugar really bad for you? I think not, or maybe just not off my sugar high just yet.

It actually has helped me get through my training last week. Trying to train for a IronMan type race on short notice has not been easy. But why not?

So "sugar" has been my friend.

18 hours of training last week.
161 miles of cycling for the week.
28 miles of running.. (A little short of my miles per week goal)
choppy 2 mile open water swim on Lake Michigan.

Not sure what I'm doing is good or bad concerning training , junk vs. quality? Time will tell on that one.

But I'm hyped up and pretty excited about my 140.6 triathlon in 5 short weeks.

So now to get back on the bike trainer and eat a slice of cake afterwards. I guess addiction does have it 's rewards sometimes.

PS. If you have any leftovers with lots of sugar in it don't forget to send it my way, or will exchange for healthy food that's sitting in my fridge.