Trip to London

I just returned from a short trip to London to hang out with my friend and co-worker Guillermo. The highlight of the trip was a visit to Craven Cottage to take in my favorite EPL side Fulham take on the Black Cats of Sunderland.

The trip was a ton of fun, mostly because I was there with a friend, and felt a slice of what it was like to live in London as opposed to doing the touristy visit I've always done in the past.

Here is some video from the game, and a hand full of photos I selected to post to the blog.

Enjoy, and more later!



This was as the Whites took the pitch for the second half.

A view down the street from Guillermo's front gate

Guillermo and his family as we headed for the park in Chiswick

A cool view atop the bridge over the Chiswick Rail Station near Guillermo's house

At the football grounds, looking at the Johnny Haynes stand from Stevenage Rd

Me on Stevenage Rd with Craven Cottage in the background

Guillermo and I from the Johnny Haynes Stand before the match

Fulham take the pitch, with Clint Dempsey ready to do battle

The Whites ready to go 90 mins

The Cottage from the inside

Just minutes to go as the Whites hang on to their 1-0 lead

It all over, 3 pts for the good guys as security rushes the field

A gritty Clint Dempsey leaves the pitch, no doubt thinking about how he'll dismantle England in So. Africa on June 12th

IMFL or TDF?

I thought this footage was great for two reasons. One, it exposes the amount of drafting that goes on in IM races. I don't recall seeing packs this size at FL 70.3, but with it rather flat, there were some groups. Two, it is just some sweet footage. I wish I new what the guy was doing. He seemed to be up on the hoods until reaching the aid station, and was getting passed like crazy, then went down on his bars an ate some people up, then as a peleton went by him, was back up on the hoods.

How HR Works

I just read this from Alan Couzen's blog. There is no mystery here - the harder you work, the more O2 your muscles need, the more your HR beats to deliver the O2 to your muscles.

Here is how you calculate required HR given a certain work rate:

Say you are riding your bike at a certain wattage that requires 3.5 Liters of O2 per minute. What will your HR be?

You need to know a few things about your physiology that most of us don't unless you've had blood work or anaerobic testing done, but if you did know, here is how you'd calculate it.

If you have 12g of hemoglobin per deciliter of blood, this deciliter would carry 160ml of O2 per liter of blood (assumes avg hemoglobin per deciliter and 100% blood saturation).

If your muscles require 3.5 liters of O2, you would need to pump 22 liters of blood per minute (3,500/160).

If you assume a cardiac stroke volume of 150ml, it will take 150 beats per minute to deliver 22 liters of blood to the muscle.

HR to push the certain wattage? 150 bpm.

October Recap

Well, October is in the books. All in all, a good month.

It started with work life balance getting back in order after working long hours during the month of September as my company was involved in a flurry of transactions revolving around entering into aircraft and engine contracts, as well as securing liquidity to bolster our balance sheet. All in, we bought 22 aircraft, did a multi billion dollar engine deal securing engines for our 787 Dreamliner aircraft we have on order with Boeing (a deal I was on the negotiating team for), sold over $1B worth of forward year air miles to Citi, our affinity program credit card partner, did a EETC debt offering and over $1.6B in sale lease back transactions (a deal I was also involved with), then did two equity offerings and one convertible debt offering.

I put on about 10 lbs between eating all of the catered food at our outside counsel's offices, and not being active while still recovering from the collarbone reconstruction. October would be the month I tried to get things back in order.

I did a fair bit of traveling in the month of Oct which made building into a routine a challenge. I was in Atlanta and Minneapolis recruiting MBAs early in the month, in Ann Arbor in the middle of the month, and had a week of meetings in DC at the end of the month.

I set off to get my running legs back under neath me, and after a few weeks of pain and suffering, dealing with all of the new runner aches and pains (shin splints for me) I feel like I'm getting closer. A run doesn't feel good yet, but we are moving away from the painful realm which is encouraging.

I was able to spend the weekend of Oct 24-25 in Austin visiting my parents and serving as a race day volunteer at Longhorn 70.3. I worked my tail off moving around transition backs for the two transition area race from about 5:30am until my back could take no more around 10am, then enjoyed watching the pros race with the special access my volunteer shirt provided me.

A few reactions after watching the end of the bike, most of the pros run, and their post race social scene:

1. If you think you want to be a pro male triathlete, then you ought to have about a 28 inch waist, plan on being no taller than about 6 feet tall, and no heavier than about 145-150lbs.
2. A 1:12 half marathon is a completely different race than a 1:50 minute half marathon.
3. Not all, but some of the top pros came in and couldn't walk well when they were done. Good to know it isn't just me. (2nd place Brian Fleischman and 3rd place Nicole Hofer were pretty gimpy)
4. After years of thinking Joanna Zieger was a "big girl" because she was so much bigger than most pro female triathletes, I now realize she is small, and the others are tiny.
5. Nicole Hofer could give Desiree Ficker (who road the lead bike for the 1st female out on the run course) a run for her money for the hottest pro female triathlete

Long horn was fun to watch, and I look forward to participating next year. Here is hoping for the same ideal conditions next year. October 17th, put it down!

After Austin, I headed to DC for work, but I was able to catch up with my friend and Pro Triathlete Lindsey Jerdonek. I met Lindsey at an industry conference in DC back in April and we've stayed in touch since. Lindsey had just wrapped up her first pro season of racing, so it was interesting to hear about her plans for next year. You can follow Lindsey and her teammate Lauren (9th place at Longhorn 70.3) at their soon to be renamed blog.

The last week of October was my best week of training since my crash. I'll actually be frank and say it was the only week that I could say felt like training and not just random acts of exercise.

I logged 6.5 hours (3hrs of running, 3hrs of biking, and 0.5 hrs of weights) this week, and even did an FTP test on the bike last Tuesday. While the results of the FTP test proved how far I have to go to get back to the level of fitness I had before the crash, it was good to get a marker so I can begin to measure my progress.

Looking ahead to Nov, here is hoping for health, productivity, and drive. I've already logged an hour in the pool this week, and am laying the ground work to give this yoga thing a try. More on that later.

Kona Prediction Time

Do to work commitments, I missed out on doing my Kona predictions last year, but I enjoy doing it and thought I should to take a few minutes and try again this year. You can see my predictions from two years ago here

The weather is shaping up to be decent. Doesn't look too hot (real feel of 92) and the winds should be okay. These athletes will cover a lot of ground however, and if you know Hawaii at all, you know it doesn't take much to go from one climate to another, so you never know what to expect.

What I'm going to do this year is predict my podium for both the men and women, one sleeper athlete, and my most intriguing athlete also from the men's and women's race. So without further ado, lets get started.

Women

At first glance, you could be fooled into thinking the women's race will be dominated by Chrissie again. She's killed the competition the last two years despite rookie jitters two years ago and the well publicized mechanical out on the Queen K last year, however like Lee Corso says, "not so fast." Chrissie left the confines of Team TBB, set out under the tutelage of tri legend Simon Lessing as her new coach, but has since left Lessing and is self coaching herself at the moment. She crushed it at Roth with a World Record of 8:31, but has had some less dominant performances in some Oly's and 70.3s since.

She'll be pushed by Rebeka Keat, Yvonne Van Vlerken, Sandra Wallenhorst, Lindsay Corbin, and Gina Ferguson, with Keat likely to give her the biggest push.

Still, we'd be out of our mind to go against the Queen. I thought hard about picking Keat or my surprise athlete in the women's field Mirinda Carfrae, but I decided that would be me trying to sensationalize this process by going against the grain. If it was my money on the line, Chrissie would be my girl.

Podium: 1. Wellington, 3. Rebeka Keat, 4. Gina Ferguson
Sleeper Athlete: Mirinda Carfrae
Sentimental Favorite: Lindsay Corbin (because she writes an awesome blog)

You might have noticed I have Keat and Ferguson finishing 3rd and 4th up above. It is because I think Carfrae will take second. This will be her first full IM, but I think she can match the effort of Sam McGlone when she finished second to Chrissie two years ago in her first move up to IM. She's got amazing top end speed, and can run with any of them. She'll sit in with the top men age groupers on the bike, and out split the rest of the field to grab her podium spot.

Mirinda Carfrae

Men:

The men's race will be much more wide open than the women's. I've got 10 guys that I like in this thing so picking my podium I'm sure was flawed with all sorts of strange rationalizations on my part, of which many won't likely come true.

As I was thinking about this post earlier this year, I was all prepared to write a long story about Andy Potts and Rasmus Henning, both who I thought had a great shot at winning this thing this year. However Potts had a terrible bike crash with an age grouper at the Chicago Tri just two months ago, and Henning apparently broke his hand a week and a half ago, and hasn't been able to swim, and won't until the day of the race. Hennings fitness is likely to be fine, and I suspect he'll still be a factor in the race, but the disruption is probably enough to crack his armor, and with this field, you've got to be bullet proof to pull through.

So we are left with the usual suspects - Craig Alexander, Macca, Norman, Eneko Llano, Marino Vanhoenacker, Cam Brown, Chris Lieto as well as some interesting upstarts such as Terenzo Bozzone, Ronnie Schildknect, and Andreas Raelert, which will make for a great race.

I'd like nothing more than to see the Alexander v Macca show down we all anticipated last year, but I just don't think we'll see it for a number of reasons. First, the rest of the field is too good to give away the stage to these guys. Second, I just don't think Macca has it in him suffer like he'll have to to make up the time necessary on the run to run through the field. Not after he's tasted the victory in Kona. He was SO driven to win this thing, that I just think the edge is gone and he hasn't put in the work, nor is willing to take himself to that dark place to do it again. Alexander, on the other hand strikes me as the type who can be a repeat performer. Much more level headed in his approach with a killer instinct, and a world of talent. Just one guys ill-advised opinion, but that is all this post is.

So I think Potts and Henning will be at the front of the swim, will ride well early but fade when the likes of Lieto, Norman, and some of the other big cycling Europeans like Twelseik ride through them. Alexander, Macca, Brown, Lovato and others will stay back in the pack, limit their losses, and it will be the guy who can lay down the 2:42 marathon who will win it.

That is why I like Timo Bracht, Andreas Raelert, Schildknect, and Cam Brown to be there in the end.

So here is how I have it:

Podium: 1. Timo Bracht, 2. Craig Alexander, 3. Eneko Llanos
Sleeper Athlete: Andreas Raelert (I still am holding back on putting Henning in here)
Sentimental Favorite: Andy Potts

Timo's performance at IM Germany just can't be ignored. Had he not skipped a stop in the penalty tent last year after a drafting call, he would have been 5th, and I think he is motivated to finish the deal this time. Llanos is very consistent, and will be there in the end with a solid all around race.

Timo Bracht

I like Raelert because the guy can fly. He's got great speed that we saw as he reeled in Bozzone in Clearwater last year at the 70.3 worlds, but just ran out of real estate. I think he ran a 1:12. He got an Olympic pedigree making the German team in 2000 and 2004 and just seems to be very aggressive in the two races I've seen him in on TV. He's shown he can go long with great races at IMAZ that I can recall off hand where he ran a 2:46 for the win against a good field.

I'll always be a big fan of Andy Potts and was heart broken when I heard of his accident. Apparently he had some heart issues after the crash, so unlike Henning, he probably had to go inactive for a while. Not good in August with this thing in Oct. But any swimmer turned triathlete gets my vote, and after hearing the guy speak at Timberman last year, he is all class.

So there we go. It should be an awesome race. I'll be in the air flying home from Minneapolis for the start, but hope to catch the bike and swim when I return home.

Trying to Get Back into the Swing of Things

I'm slowly trying to get my athletic life back in order after my biking accident. I took a major step today by getting back out on the bike, but realize I have a long way to go. I think putting something down in this blog may help, so here it goes.

My accident was just over 8 weeks ago, and as far as the collar bone and shoulder go, things are getting back to normal. I have no pain, am able to sleep pretty much however I want to now that I've been able to add sleeping on my right (bad) side into the rotation. I have limited flexibility in the shoulder, but am not far off, and probably need to get back in the pool to get it all back.

I really let myself go while I was out. I aloud myself to eat/drink whatever I wanted to, and was very inactive. As a result, I've dropped a lot of strength and muscle mass, replaced it with fat and then some with my weight up around 4 pounds, and feel generally sluggish.

I started running 2 weeks ago, and felt like I'd never run before in my life. Slow pace, HR off the charts, and all of the running pains I'd cured myself of are now back. Shin splints are debilitating right now.

I had my sights set on getting back into the pool at the beginning of Oct, but the pool my masters team swims in is having the winter roof (bubble) installed this week, so we are at a different pool, at 5:00am (I don't do workouts pre 6:00am), and it costs an extra $15 for the week = I'll wait for the bubble to be installed.

Today, I got out on the bike outside for the first time since my crash. It was a chilly misty afternoon and was quite pleasant out there. I figured if I wanted the roads mostly to myself, I should wait until the Cowboys game started. So I did, and it seemed to work. I rode the same route I was on when I had my accident, which was therapeutic, and the ride actually felt good. I believe after logging 75 mins out there that cycling and swimming will be my road back to greater fitness, not running. Running will just be a byproduct of the improvements.

I must admit, I was nervous as hell when cars came up on me from behind. I did a lot of shoulder checking and wasn't comfortable at all. I'm sure that will pass with time. I kind of appreciate the heightened vigilance. It will keep me safer in the long run.

So my goals in no particular order (both long term and short) are as follows:

1. swim comfortably
2. ride without fear
3. swim hard
4. train 5 hrs in a week
5. train 10 hrs in a week
6. get my body back to a fit 170
7. feel comfortable running again
8. race again
9. PR in a run or tri

I took a minute when I reached the place I broke my collar bone to take a look around, and to try to figure out how I may have ended up in the spot I ended up in. Here is a photo of the corner. I ended up just on the other side of this sign my bike is leaning up against.


So here we are. Baby steps is the key, and so is appreciating the process. If I add an extra hour of training each week, I'll be back to where I want to be in about a month.

Happy trails.

Checking In

Not much to report these days. Surgery was two weeks ago so I'm still more or less useless. Work has been busy so it has stepped up to fill the void, and I've taken to watching a bit more TV, playing with my kids a bit more, and eating food and drinking good beer more regularly too. I'm developing a gut to prove it.

This coming week is fantasy football draft week. I'm in two leagues this year, one with neighbors and one with work buddies. Looking forward to draft nights, getting my roster set up, and football getting started.

X-Rays of my New Hardware

These X-Rays were taken of me while I was still under, so I only know by the time stamp on them when they were taken.

This first one was taken at 3:04pm, about 2 hours after I went under. I only count 5-6 screws at this point in the procedure.

This one was taken at 3:27pm, and it looks like the remaining screws are in place 14-15 in total.

And here was the last one stamped 4:36pm, about an hour before I woke up.

I'm Not Working Out These Days, But My Kidneys Are!

X-Rays of the Fracture

This is an X-ray that was taken about 30 minutes after my bike crash on Aug 6th.

I'll try to pick up one from radiology over at the hospital when I'm back over there for a Dr. apt on Wed. That one will show off the bionic shoulder I'm now sporting.

To orient you a bit, this is my right shoulder. The bone is broken into 4 pieces, although only 3 are visible here. I've marked the pieces with arrows. The top pointy piece nearly came through the skin as a compound fracture. Then there is a small fragment that runs up and down, and the last piece which has a fracture in it is lowered by the weight of my arm, but runs left to right.

It is a bit confusing to view this 3D image in 2D. Your ribs on your back come up higher than the front, so all of the ribs that appear above the clavicle are in the back. This bone had as much forward protrusion is it did, upward protrusion, but that isn't really evident as you can't see that without the 3rd axis.

Changes

A lot has happened since I last posted. To get everyone up to date, I was on a training ride last Thursday night, and as I was approaching a sharp right hand bend, a truck was approaching from the opposite direction. The truck cut the corner of that bend, came all the way over into my lane of travel, and to avoid getting hit, I dove into the ditch. Within a few feet of coming off the shoulder or the road, I lost control of my bike and was launched over my bars.

My power meter said I was travelling 17.5 mph when the accident happened. I landed on my right elbow and shoulder, and immediately felt my collar bone snap.

I've had 3 major injuries in my life now. A dislocated knee cap, a fractured femur, and now this. I have to say this was very close to as intense at the moment right after the break as the femur fracture was, however the collar bone pain has lingered much longer, and pretty much any time you move, it is terribly painful.

The weird thing about this injury is that the outboard piece of the bone is sagging from the weight of my arm, and it is causing that piece of the bone to put pressure on several nerves that run down my arm. A lot of my pain is from these nerves and is felt in my arm versus the bone itself. I get sensations of ice, then sensations of rubbing alcohol being poured on an open wound. Very strange.

Immediately after the crash, I was able to get my phone out of my pocket and began to call my wife, and my friend David. David came and picked me up and took me to the ER where I met my wife.

Its is a long story and an investigation is pending, but someone did get a license plate and leaving the scene of an accident without exchanging information is a felony. The driver, took one look at me after it happened, then sped off.

So my collar bone is fractured in 4 places, and later this morning, I am going in to have surgery to have a plate installed over the pieces of bone.

The prognosis is that I'll be in the hospital over night, then will be in a sling for 7-10 days. No weight bearing activities for 4-6 weeks, then some therapy to regain range of motion and strength loss.

Thank you very much for all of the emails and text messages that many of you have sent me. It really helps to cheer me up. I'm very lucky to have such great friends.

Thanks also to my wife. She has been nothing short of amazing. She is the most caring, patient, sympathetic, giving, practical, loving, and strong person I've ever known.

I'll check in again when I'm typing with two hands again.

Disco Triathlon

The Disco Triathlon is in the bag. This was my 3rd time doing this race, ('05, and '07) and the 3rd time taking on this course out at Lake Ray Roberts in North Denton (the '05 Disco was in Grapevine, but the '07 Texas Man was on the current Disco course).

This course has owned me in the past, and while my goal was to prevent that from happening this time, I'd give myself a "B" in my efforts today. I've come to understand I have a pacing problem. I can't hold back and I absolutely wilt on the run. This course is not the place you want to be wilting on the run. It is undulating the entire time, and is usually very hot.

The swim went as well as possible from a time perspective. I was in a wave with 39 and under men, and while I was the 4th guy out of the water, I was out first for my age group. I paid for it though. I was gunning it from the start and by the time I realized I was trashing myself, I couldn't settle down.

The swim started off right into the sun, so we couldn't see the buoy until we were right on top of it. Other than that, it was a fairly normal swim. I was on my own for a bit, with a guy for a bit, then got dropped by that guy in the last 400 yards or so.

Swim: 19:23, 1st AG (out of 27), 8th overall (out of 273 men and women)

T1 was brutal. I was so tired running up the beach, along a path, and into transition. I thought I was going to pass out. More evidence that I blew my wad in the swim. I took my time trying to settle down in there, put my bike jersey on inside out (on accident) and was off.

T1: 2:45

The bike was alright. I've decided now that this bike course is deceivingly difficult. It never really is flat with many rollers, lots of chip seal roads, and a few chewed up roads that slow you down a bit. No one ended up putting up a blazing time, and I just managed to hold better than 20 mph out there, a little off from my last few efforts. I tried to keep it calm on the bike, and was favoring my right leg injury from the bike crash the week before just a bit choosing to stay in the saddle when there were a couple of climbs and accelerations I'd have preferred to stand up on.

Only 3 guys in my age group passed me on the ride.

We got lucky with the weather today. There was cloud cover for the first half of the ride, and the highs are a good 10 degrees off the mid 100s we had earlier in the week.

Bike: 1:08.47 10th AG, 83rd overall

T2 was quick and easy 1:01

The run was the part of this race I anticipated the most. As I said, I've run terrible on this course in the past. Early on off the bike I could tell that I'd probably already been anaerobic a bit too much earlier in the day, and that it was going to be lactate buildup in my legs that was going to be the limiter on the day, not HR, and probably not heat.

I tried to settle in to a decent pace. The course is out and back, part on paved paths in tree cover, and part out on an open road with no shade. I was really trying to hold back on the out thinking best case, I could negative split the run, but the more likely scenario was that it would be conserving energy to keep me from walking later (a problem every time I run out there)

I believe I was able to average around 8:50 miles on the way out (the way out is a little longer than the way in). On the way back, it was a struggle. I hung in there pretty tough, walked some aid stations, and literally shuffled up the big hill on the paths, and average around 9:35 back home.

I got passed by 4-5 guys in my age group in the last 10 minutes of the run which was disappointing, but tried to hang in there as best I could.

Run: 56:36 18th AG, 122 overall

Time: 2:28:29, 13th AG, 72nd overall

I believe this is the first time I've been under 2:30 in an Olympic race, but the bike was 1.8mi short of an official Oly distance race, and I actually think my 2:32 in Galveston this year on a 450 yard shorter swim, but 5 mi bike, and 0.3 mile longer run is a better time. It was much cooler then, and a much easier course than Lake Ray Roberts, so I think it is a solid effort today.

The family came up to the State Park to watch the race, and got to enjoy a really cool beach on the lake. My kids and the McClain kids had a blast swimming around, though no one brought suits so we had to improvise a bit.

Here are a few photos our friends the McClain's took. Katie (the photographer) is one of Ingrid's girl friends, our kids play together several times each week, and Patrick did the race with me (and did quite well in his 2nd tri ever, and 1st Oly ever)

Truck'n it into the finish shoot

Family photo, Jake and his dong

This has me Fired Up!

Preseason matches have commenced. Talk of a Peter Crouch signing has me intrigued. This clip is gas on the fire.



I hope this doesn't jinx it!

Ouch Still

I'm still pretty beat up from the bike crash. I've tried to stick with the training plan, but I've still got some internal bleeding going on in my leg.

When I woke up the day after the crash, my bruise had about tripled in size on my right leg, and I had a matching bruise though not as bad on my left side. My abs and ankle were sore too.

I can run okay on my legs, but cycling still is hard. I am not able to lift my leg very well, especially if the lift includes an internal rotation on the hip. So putting on socks or shorts while standing is nearly impossible, however running isn't bad. Cycling is odd. If I'm pulling up on the pedal, it hurts, so I think I'm sort of free loading on my right side when I ride. I can tell because my power numbers have been off. And after I cycle, I can tell my bruise has changed color with a new dark spot at the point where the joint/muscle underneath the skin is most painful.

The bruise is migrating down my leg and now runs down the inner half of my leg halfway down to my knee. I suppose where gravity takes the blood from either sitting or standing.

I'm going to race this weekend, but don't expect much. I can't get down on the aero bars due to the scrape on my forearm, but hope that a couple of days off the bike might help. I just don't want to throw away $100 that I spent on this entry fee when I'm sure I can get out there and at least use the race as a catered training day.

Here is what the bruise looks like now. It is a little muted in color since I just pulled an ice pack off of it.

Man vs Pavement

After what my records say is 12,101 miles of mostly event free riding since I got my first road bike in 2002, my number came up today and I put the bike sideways.

I was making a left hand turn at a 3 way intersection (I didn't have a stop sign) and looked over my shoulder heading into the turn and saw a guy on a hog with a chick on the back. I was far enough ahead to where I didn't think he'd try to come around me, and started to make the turn. As I was about a qtr of the way into the turn, I heard him twist the throttle and it sounded like he was speeding up. As I looked over my shoulder, I saw him coming pretty close, and heard him yell something at me. It all startled me a bit and I'm not sure if I touched the breaks, or if it caused me to swerve a bit in the apex of the turn, but as I looked back to the road in front of me, the bike was coming out from under me and I went over on my left side, forearm to pavement. The pavement won - the biker and his chick rode on. Thanks asshole!

The worst of it all was that somewhere in the crash, I took the handle bars or elbow pad to the aero bar to my right leg, right at the hip flexor/groin, about 2 inches from my man business. I have got a deep bruise there, and can't lift my leg at the waist much higher than is necessary to walk. The left hip has very minor road rash, my shorts didn't even rip. It was my forearm that took the brunt of the fall, and it is scraped up with road rash pretty good. About 6 inches starting near the elbow running about 2/3 of the way up to the wrist.

I was 40 minutes into a 3 hr ride, so I'm not happy about the training volume shortfall that resulted from the crash. The bike was not rideable, but should be fine with a new front brake cable, set of bar tape, and a trued front wheel. The front brake cable and bar tape are only a week old having been replaced last weekend. Bad luck there.

I downloaded the ride data to see what my HR did during the crash. I was cruising along on a flat stretch at around 18.0 mph and a 136 HR. As best I can tell, I crashed between 39:00 mins and 39:02 mins and was going 15.8 mph at 135 bpm. My HR peaked at 39:09 at 150 bpm and stayed there until 39:16 before it began to drop. The data stopped recording at 39:19. Pretty interesting.

I'm sure I can't run right now, but wonder how long it will last. I'm icing my leg as I type, and it feels better now than it did before I iced it the first time, but I expect to be very sore tomorrow morning.

I do have a race on the calendar a week from today that I'd really like to do, but we'll just have to play it slow and see how it goes. I'm going to skip my swim planned for tomorrow morning and will see about a light jog tomorrow night. If that goes well, I'll jump back on the schedule come Tuesday. If not, I'll just continue to play it day by day. Next week is supposed to be 12.5 hour week with much of the work front loaded to give me a day of recovery before the race, but that plan appears to be in jeopardy.

Be careful out there.

Check this Out

Seen While Out on the Bike

I love running into weird stuff while out on the bike and being able to snap a photo.

My next PDA is definitely going to have a higher resolution camera on it (I've got my eye on the Palm Pre when my current contract expires next January)

Last Tuesday, I got in 25 miles after work. This photo of a Zebra however was the second most unusual thing I saw on this ride. The most unusual thing I saw was over before I could get my phone in camera mode, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Lets just say it was a donkey show, but the natural kind, not of the Tijuana variety. It was both fascinating and gross, but the details aren't fit for much more than a frat house, so you'll have to use your imagination.

Rough Training Weekend

Well, I knew hopping a flight to spend a long 3 day weekend at the beach in South Carolina wasn't conducive to hitting all of my planned workouts this weekend. There would be no masters swim, and running in that swamp is torture.

Sure enough, I didn't really make the most of a tough situation, and fell short of the weekly volume goal.

I managed to get in a 3 hour ride this evening followed by a 25 minute transition run. I weighed myself before and after and lost 5 lbs durng the session despite downing 5.25 20oz bottles of fluid.

Next week is a big week. Hopefully work will cooperate. It is shaping up to be a challenge.

How to Start a Spontaneous Dance Party

This is classic! Sasquatch Music Fest '09



However, you had better be ready to stick to it for a while. These things don't start in a matter of seconds. You have to work at.

Wednesday's Storm

You may have heard that my city, Flower Mound was battered and bruised by a massively intense storm on Wednesday evening (around 6:30pm) again at 1am and 5:30am on Thursday morning. Power lines, trees, fences, chimneys, roofs all came down. We persoanlly had pretty severe roof damage.

This couple videod the action while in their car. I luckily left work a tad early that day and got home about 10 minutes before this started, but many of my colleagues had drives home that were just like this.

This is along 1171 a bit east of where I live, but the storm was moving west to east so this had just passed over my house.

When I first heard the tornado sirens, I looked out of one of my windows, and the clouds were low and circling just like the footage at the beginning of this clip.

Here is a snap shot of the radar around that time.

Dolphins Blowing Bubble Rings

I was totally blown away by this.

Crazy Commies!

Trip to Phoenix

With my wife and kids headed down to Houston for a girls weekend, I decided to hop a flight Friday afternoon to Phoenix to visit my brother and his family.

To get a jump on the mid day heat, we went to the Botanical Gardens on Saturday morning to check out the Dale Chihuly sculpted glass exhibit which was aesthetically interspersed with the unique desert vegetation. Please excuse the poor quality photos from my cell phone cam.

Me and my nephew, Daniel

not glass, real flowers!

Brother and his family

After the gardens, we stopped by In-N-Out Burger for me to get my fill on one of my favorite fast food joints I frequented as a kid in Southern California. Double-Double, fries, vanilla shake. Mmmmm!

It turned out the Atlanta Braves were in town playing the Diamondback, so Todd and I headed over to the stadium and were treated to a great game. The ballpark was very impressive.

Chase Field

Famous Outfield Pool

Fulham FC to Europa Cup

I don't believe I've wrote about it here before, but my favorite Premiere League soccer team has just wrapped up one of the most remarkable seasons in the teams long history.

After fighting off relegation from the Premiere League down to the Championship League (the 2nd division in English Federation Soccer) last year by winning their last game of the season, this year they climbed out of the bottom half of the table to 7th to end the season. By finishing 7th, they have qualified for the Europa League Tournament, formerly known as the UEFA Cup. Quite an accomplishment for this smaller budget team.

I began following Fulham about 3 seasons ago because they had one of the best US born soccer players to play well in the EPL, Brian McBride. Last year, the team had at one point 5 American Internationals on the team (Clint Dempsey, Eddie Johnson, Casey Keller, Carlos Bocanegra, and McBride before he got hurt). While Dempsey is the only remaining American (Johnson has been on loan all year) to play for Fulham this year, I have grown fond of many of the non US players and really enjoyed following the club this season.

I was able to catch about a dozen matches this year on FSC, including the deep run in the FA Cup prior to their loss to Man U, and look forward to what I hope will be a strong showing in Europe.

Reagan Dancing with Donald

Some Photos from Florida 70.3

Had to pirate these from the race photo site. Site to excel, excel to paint, paint to jpeg. They look a little shabby, like the race.

Florida 70.3 Race Report

The morning started with a 4:30am wake up, then 30 minutes of trying to put down 800 calories with no appetite. I had a bottle of ensure, yogurt parfait, half a clif bar, a banana, half a cup of coffee, and a bottle of Gatorade endurance. Pretty gross to be putting that all down that early.

By 5:15am I was headed down to the lobby to see about getting a taxi or courtesy car over to the race. The courtesy car picked me up and we were at the race drop off to catch a shuttle bus in to Fort Wilderness where the transition area and race venue were.

The race was on the Disney property, but Disney had no further involvement than that.

I decided to hit the restrooms first, then go in and get my transition area set up. The race started at 6:20 and my wave would go off at 7:21, but transition closed at 6:15, so I had just enough time to get things set up. As I mentioned, my transition spot wasn't ideal. It turns out that the run out of the swim was very long, but it was because we basically ran around the outside of the transition area all the way around and entered very close to where my stuff was located, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

After getting squared away, I made my way over to the beach. They weren't letting people into the water, so I had no warm up prior to the race. Instead, I found a patio chair and sat for about 40 minutes until my wave got closer.

The swim started in about knee deep water, and you could run about 20 steps before it got too deep. As the gun went off, I took off and tried to find feet. After 2-3 minutes I came across some and decided to settle in. I figured if they were ahead of me after 2-3 minutes, they were decent swimmers, but once back there, I really felt like we were going slow. I didn't think there was any way I was catching that good of a draft. I stuck with that swimmer for about 2 minutes until we first began to hit slow swimmers from the previous wave, and we got separated while working around a bunch, and I pulled away from that guy and moved on on my own.

The swim was very hectic. There were masses of people in large clumps that were very hard to get around. I found myself having to stop, pop up, pick a line, then shoot a narrow gap until I was clear, then do it again.

It wasn't a wetsuit legal swim, and there were lots of people struggling with that fact I believe. I can't tell you how many people were doing breastroke. There is nothing more dangerous to swimmers behind you than to do a breastroke kick. It is a wide kick, and in murky water, very hard to see coming, and is extremely dangerous for those around and behind you. I must have dodged half a dozen breastroke kicks headed right for my nose that missed by inches. Really scary.

The swim seemed to have been long. I thought so based on feel and time, and I overheard others with the same sentiment post race.

Swim: 31:33, 8th out of 239 AG, 104th overall

T1 was as I mentioned very long. You run about 300 yards from the swim exit to swim entrance. I spent only a few seconds at the racks before I was off to make my way through the length of the transition racks to the exit, again about 200 yards. I clipped in on the bike, and did not make the same mistake I did at Lonestar.

T1 4:34

The bike was a 1 loop bike course. We left the Disney property soon into the ride and didn’t return until the final miles. The course was pretty non descript. I recall seeing some cows and orange groves, and a few new track housing neighborhoods, but I really wasn’t paying an awful lot of attention.

My plan was to stay controlled and I think I was able to do that despite setting a bike PR for myself. The roads where very smooth and fast, and the course had about a 20 miles section of gentle hills in the middle. I only switched out of the big gear one or two times.

My plan was to find someone riding a little slower than I was comfortable riding, and to sit behind them at the legal distance, and make my progress that way. That way I was sure I was staying conservative. I pretty much rode the entire way behind 3 different guys.

It was getting to be hot, but the breeze on the bike masked it pretty well. I did notice salt on my shorts and face from the sweat, and knew it was going to get ugly on the run.

I took down 5 gels, 3x500mg sodium tablets, 3-4 bottles of water, 1 bottle of Pure Sport, and about 2 bottles of Gatorade Endurance. I felt the urge to pee about half way through the ride so I was confident that I was absorbing fluids, and was pretty much on the edge of feeling bloated the entire way.

Bike: 2:40:14 (21.0 mph), 88th out of 239 AG, 693rd overall

T2 went pretty well. This was the first time I saw Ingrid on the day. I had to make the long journey through the racks to my row, got switched over quick, took a swig of water and got my GPS synched, and was on my way.

T2: 2:32

The run was a 3 loop course. It was flat, hot, and much of it was on grass. Not scenic in the least despite being on the Disney property. We were in a pine forest for the first half mile, on back roads the next mile, then on grass next to a canal for 2+ miles before getting back on to roads to finish off the loop. The grass was very difficult to run on, and there wasn’t much shade out there.
First thing I did out on the run was find a port-o-john to relieve the bladder. After that, I tried to settle in to a slow and comfortable pace that I thought I could hold. I tried to ask myself very frequently if there was any way I could run slower, and if the answer was yes, then I slowed down.

My HR however was climbing and climbing and wasn’t stopping when it reached the Z3 spot I hoped it would stop at. After about 25 minutes, I was well into Z4, and was burning up.

At around the 3 mile mark, I broke the seal and had to walk. I would walk/run the rest of the race. By mile 5 I was doing 2 min/1min run/walk, which eventually fell down to 1min/1min. On a couple of occasions I would try to run as long as I could, but never could go more than 3 minutes, and would be wrecked for the next 10 minutes or so barely able to do 1/1 run/walk to recover.

With about 2.2 miles to go, I figured I had 29 minutes to keep my time under 6 hours, the only thing left to salvage the day after all of my other goals were long gone. I bore down and upped my run/walk splits to 90 sec/30 sec to up the overall pace.

With about half mile to go, I had to run carefull as my right calf was twitching as it would near a cramp on certain steps. It nearly seized up within 25 yards of the finish line, but I managed to cross without making a scene.

It was brutally hot out there. Lots of carnage on the course. I saw lots of people walking, people puking, people fainting. I ended up with the worst sun burn I’ve had in a long time despite putting on spf 30 the night before and morning of the race.

Run: 2:38:53 (12:08 pace) 182 out of 239 AG, 1476 overall

Time: 5:57:44, 124 out of 239 AG, 965 overall

After crossing the line, I just felt terrible. My ears were popping, I was woozy, and I had to search hard for some food and drink. I don't feel like going on the WTC rant, but they are terrible race organizers. It was so corporate, not designed for what was best for the athletes, and the post race support was cheap. They ran out of things out on the course and in the post race tent well before the later waves had crossed the line. It was really disappointing. This race was run by NAS until WTC bought all of the NAS races except for IM Canada at the end of 2008, so this may be a bad sign of things to come for these biggest of races in the US under the new management. I'm certain they made a fortune on the merchandising however, so I don't expect any changes.

So overall, not all that great of a race. I’m not disappointed because I pretty much got over the disappointment when the training fell apart back in March and April. It just sort of was what it was. I finished. It wasn’t as slow as my first 70.3, and wasn’t as fast as my last.

I came away from the race with 5 immediate notes on things to focus on for my next 70.3 in Oct. In no particular order, they are:

1. Increase the running as a percentage of my total tri training, more and longer long runs, more weekly volume, more running off the bike.
2. Do core work. My abs and low back are really sore after I race, which means I am using them and they aren’t up to the task. Maybe yoga is the answer.
3. Detail the objectives of each workout further. In base, go slower. Add more specificity to each workout.
4. Test more. Identify strengths and weakness and adjust training accordingly.
5. Stick to a diet, and get down to 165 by Oct.

The plan going forward is to take it easy for the rest of the month. I probably won’t train until after Memorial Day weekend. I’ll probably use the WKO+ software to monitor my fitness loss over time, and will start training when it is off 20-25% of the level it was at for the race.

I’m going to do a 6 week strength training block that will start up in a week or two. The purpose will be to add back some muscle, strengthen the tendons, and get myself ready for the Oct 70.3 training block.

I’ll build up the run volume in the month of June and would like to get up to around 100 miles of running a month by July.

I’ll do a 20 week build up to Long Horn, and will do a proper 12 weeks of base work before I start to take the governor off. That means the program will start in the second week of June.

Holy S That Hurt

I'm convalescing in the room, trying to muster the strength to get out of bed and cleaned up for dinner in 45 minutes.

I'll follow up with a proper report tomorrow perhaps, but I can sum up the race by saying it was the most difficult race I've ever done. The good news was that I found a ride to the race this morning, though it did cost me $18.It eventually would go downhill from there.

The swim was (long) a freaking war out there. I played pinball and dodged slow pokes threatening my face with errant breastroke kicks the whole way (rant on people doing breastroke in triathlons forthcoming). The bike was fast mostly due to the pristine roads and lots of legal drafting, but was surprisingly hilly at times. But the freaking kick in the nuts was that run. Absolute carnage it was so hot. Bodies everywhere, lots of walking, puking, fainting. I obviously walked a lot. There was no choice. The other thing that I underestimated was how much of this run course was on grass. I'd heard some of it was, but I'd guess about 7 of the 13 miles were on grass. Not trails, grass. It made for slower going.

I'm glad it is over, and that I managed to not out split my run with my bike spit. An absolute no-no which I came close to doing. I'm looking forward to a break from training. It is overdue I'm afraid.

Thoughts on Race Eve

I'm sitting back in the hotel while the family is over at the Magic Kingdom having dinner. I'd planned to go with them, but today's pre race activities were WAY more involved than I ever could have imagined they would be, and I opted to lay low and hang back in the room getting things squared away for tomorrow.

I like to make lists when it comes to packing things up for anything. Every trip I take starts with a list of what to pack. Races definitely have lists on what to bring. I guess in my mind, it removes stress on race morning. This race has had 3 lists due to how complex an undertaking it is. So with all of this preparation, you might find it shocking that with 12 hours until I'll depart for the race site, I still have no idea how I'm going to get there.

The beauty of Disney is that you don't need your own transportation. Buses, shuttles, monorails, water taxis, etc. But no transportation to the race site. The concierge looked at me cross eyed when I asked how I was supposed to get to the race. You'd think they'd know, there are only ~2500 of us in this thing.

I guess I'm going to try to take a taxi. Hopefully I'm not waiting long for it.

The race site was a flipping zoo. This is my first NAS run race, and I've got to tell you, I miss the personal touches and family focus of Keith Jordan's Endorfun sports races. This thing is a freaking money making machine, and I'd be lying if I said it wasn't apparent that that was the top priority. I stood in line for 20 minutes to buy a visor, and they had 4 cash registers running full tilt.

I still have no idea if they think the swim will be wetsuit legal or not, but I didn't even bring mine, so it doesn't impact my list. I just wondered whether the other guys in my wave would have them.

The race starts at 6:20am, but I'm in the very last wave, and start at 7:24am. Plenty of time to let it heat up on the run, and based on my last 70.3 in Austin when I was one of the last waves, it means I'll have to swim over about 500 slower athletes and probably ride by another 1000-1200. It will be like riding in the MS 150, passing people pretty much every 7-9 seconds. It makes it very dangerous.

My bike made it to Florida with no set backs. I got it all squared away, took it for a short spin and it is now racked and getting rained on every now and then with the Florida afternoon showers. Awesome!

So let me gripe a little more about transition. It isn't an ideal spot. Long and narrow, and wouldn't you know, my bike is about as far as you could be from the swim entrance and the bike exit. I couldn't even see the water from where I left my bike, and from my best guess, I'll have to run a little over a qtr mile from the water to my bike, then I get to turn around and run about 200 yards with my bike to get out of transition, and another 200 yards or so when I get back in. The good news, I only have about 15 yards to get to the run exit, but who cares, I'll have running shoes on and no bike with me. I expect my S/B transition to take at least 7-10 minutes, and I promise, I'll be moving to keep it from being longer.

The other thing that has me pretty concerned is the heat. When you're in the sun, it is brutal. It seems worst in the mornings when the humidity seems to be highest. I definitely haven't adjusted yet, as I pretty much start sweating profusely the moment I get in the sun, even when standing still. I'm going to have to focus on staying hydrated, settle for a couple of porto-john stops, and perhaps a pee break on the bike just to be sure I'm topping off before the run starts.

I'm trying to pick up a positive before I end this post... Still thinking...Hmm. Maybe this. The run appears to be partially on paved trails through a tall pine forest. Maybe there will be some shade?

After this race, I'm going to enjoy the rest of my Disney vacation with my family. I'm already making lists of what I'm going to eat/drink. We're having dinner tomorrow night at a brew house, so I hope to put down 3-4 pale ales, have some ice cream, a bloody marry on Monday morning. I'm taking a few weeks off after this race, at least 1-2 with zero training, and I'm really looking forward to it.

But first, I'm going to take myself to school tomorrow and teach myself a little more about my limits, my thoughts at dark moments, and how I handle extreme discomfort, all for extreme adulation. And to cross another milestone off of my life to-do list.

Official Florida 70.3 Preview

As promised, here is a bit more detail on my thoughts going in the Florida 70.3. As I mentioned below, this will be my 3rd 70.3 race, and first of a planned two in 2009.

Just a quick recap to bring us up to the present. I ended my last triathlon season with the Long Horn 70.3 race, where I had successfully executed a 12 week build up, and saw the fruits of that build up on race day. It wasn't perfect, but I exceeded my expectations, had confidence that I could self coach myself to newer highs, and was enthused for the coming off season.

I entered the off season with a run focus, and procured the assistance of Gorilla Multisport's David Gillen to write my workouts and give me guidance. I made some good strides in improving my run, and had several PRs over the course of the 4 months of focus.

On the heels of my last running event of the run focus, I jumped in to tri training upping the bike and swim volume from 1-2 times per week, to normal tri prep levels. I spent 4.5 days at a tri camp in Tucson logging a lot of miles in a short period of time, and within a few weeks, my cycling fitness felt very good for this early in the year.

For the Jan-April period, my training volume was up 65 hours over those same four months the year before. Year to date I have swum 90k yards, biked 1,228 miles, and run 333 miles.

All are stats I should be proud of, and I am. What I'm a little disappointed about is that I failed to execute on the prescribed volume in my most key weeks leading up to this race on Sunday.

It wasn't for lack of motivation, but illness. In early March I came down with a wicked GI infection that knocked me out of commission for 5 days, knocked 6 lbs off of me, and just so happened to occur on the first week of a big 3 week block. That week was lost, so I scaled down weeks 2 and 3 of the block knowing I was going to be a bit weak from the weight loss. I was able to hit the prescribed 11 hours of training the following week (3/16-3/22) however I couldn't bring it up to the prescribed 13.5 the following week coming in at just 10.5.

The second big 3 week training block was slated for 4/6-4/26, and again was derailed by sickness. This time, a respiratory infection, probably worsened by allergies that just go nuts up here in North TX every spring. I was able to hit the 11 hrs prescribed in week 1 (4/6-4/12) which came on the heels of a pretty good race in Galveston the weekend before, and was off to a great start to week 2 of the block until it came on. I went to the Dr. early, got antibiotics, but the cough lingered and fear of bronchitis forced me to keep the volume in check. Rather than hitting 13.5 hrs in week 2, I hit 7.2, and rather than 15 hours in week 3, I mustered 5.5.

Not ideal to say the least.

So the down side to all of this is that I don’t have peak fitness, and don't have a block to taper down off of, and I still have a lingering respiratory infection that hasn’t fully left me. I've had to modify the taper a bit by just keeping the volume consist in the 8-10 hrs range and will hold that clip right up to race day. any more and I'd fatigue, any less and my fitness would drop too low too fast.

The upside however is that I’ve got a pretty big block of fitness under me that has built up over the past 10 months. I also know that fitness being equal, I am a better runner now than I was 7 months ago. The other upside is that I think I can fine tune my race strategy a bit having had two 70.3s under my belt going in to this one.

I’m not really anxious or nervous at all which I attribute to experience from the prior two 70.3s, and just need to always be playing it conservative at every turn out there so I don’t wilt. The opportunity for an epic bonk is very real!

So my thoughts for the race are that I need to play it conservative, NOT GET SWEPT UP IN THE EXCITEMENT OF RACING, and focus on executing my race strategy. That means that I need to chill out as soon as I can on the swim, especially after the beach start which always sends the HR up, and makes for a little more chaos than I'm used to at the start of a swim. On the bike, I know I'm going to feel good out there. I'll have the race wheels on, the aero helmet on, and it is going to feel fast. I need to chill out and go SLOW for the first 20-30 miles or so.

I wouldn't be surprised if I swim a 30 min swim (6 mins slower than PR), bike a 2:50 (7 mins slower than PR), and have 7-10 mins of transition time before I even hit the run. That means I hit the run right around the 3:30 mark. The run is a complete crap shoot still unfortunately. I'm pretty comfortable running sub 10 min miles, but am not confident I won't be forced to walk because I'm a little concerned about the heat and humidity when I get onto the run. It should be approaching the low 90s as the run ends, and I’m sure it will be steamy. We’ve actually had a pretty mild spring thus far so I have not had the opportunity to bake myself a little bit in preparation.

I don't think I'll PR at this race. Part of the reason is because the swim at my PR race was about 5 minutes short. If I can come in around 5:45, I'll take it.

So here are my race goals in no particular order:

• Swim smart, stay on course
• Don't let my HR sky rocket in transitions
• Stay aero, but sit up and stretch at opportune spots (up hills, tailwinds, turns, etc.)
• Supplement wisely
• Chill out until the 10 mile mark on the run (because I'll be in survival mode at that point any ways)
• Minimize the walking on the run course to aid stations only
• PR my run split, which is currently 2:21.50 (a whopping 29 mins slower than my stand alone half)
• Shoot for 5:45, but don't watch watch. If it happens, it happens.

So there you go. I'll check back in post race.

Florida 70.3 Pre-Preview

One week from tomorrow I toe the line for my 3rd Half Ironman 70.3 distance race. The race will coincide with a family trip to Disney for a week with all three of my kids, wife, and my mother and father in-law.

The week of preparation and travel begins tomorrow when I drop off my bike at Richardson Bikemart where it will be picked up by the tri bike transport guys to make the journey to Orlando.

I'll stop in again early next week with my thoughts on the race. I can broadly summarize my thoughts by saying that I'm not where I hoped to be heading into this race. My training was so inconsistent in the critical build up weeks, that it will certainly have a negative impact on my outcome. I'm hoping I'm not so under prepared that I end up having a miserable experience out there, but only time will tell. I'm not planning on that being the case, and have chosen to focus on a couple of things this time now that I'm just a hair more experienced than last time I tried one of these things. I'll elaborate on these items I'm going to focus on in my next post.

More later...

Zydeco Friday - Enjoy!

Want to feel rythmless? Watch this. I found it while searching for footage of my all time Zydeco favorite, Boozoo Chavis, who can be seen below.

Boozoo Chavis - Johnnie Billy Goat
by fredozydeco

NZ All Blacks

The Haka!