cheers, jeers and miscellania

• Lance Armstrong was staying at the hotel we stayed at. He was walking out with a couple of friends as we were walking in. Nobody even realized it was him ...except for us. I immediately turned to the J-man and said, "that's Lance." Then I said, "his calves are a lot smaller than i thought they'd be." Some people notice nice butts, i notice calves. i guess in his case, size doesn't matter. 

• Some of you know from my blog that i was adopted at birth. i don't know a whole heck of a lot about my biological roots but i do know that i was born in Winter Haven. Winter Haven and Haines City (where the race was at), are pretty much almost one in the same as they are so close to each other. As we were driving through Winter Haven, I looked over at the J-man and said, "thank god i didn't have to grow up here." there is pretty much nothing there to make note of. at one time, it was the home of circus world and the boardwalk and baseball theme parks. both parks have since met their demise. once you exit off of I-4, it looks like a place where time has stood still for ages.  it appeared very run down and economically poor. I couldn't help but think how lucky I was to have had such a great childhood (in Tampa), yet it made me sad too because I couldn't help thinking about my Mom and Dad, the one's who raised me. i miss them so much. 

• On race morning, I had some time to kill after getting body marked and setting up transition so J-man and I found a place to sit and people watch, which is always a hoot. As I was sitting there lathering on the sunscreen, I overheard this chic as she is walking by, talking about the HUGE alligator she saw yesterday in the lake we’re about to swim in. I look over at J-man with eyes wide open and said, “why did I have to just hear that?” I did my best to get that visual out of my head of the alligator swimming underneath me. I won’t lie though, I did think about the alligator for like 5 seconds, then I was fighting for space the rest of the time so my mind was preoccupied thank goodness. 

• I forgot to mention in my race report how awesome the residents along the run course were. there were a few on the first mile of the run loop (aka: the big climb) who came out with their water hoses and sprayed us down. it was so awesome. i made sure to run by them every loop. i didn't care that my shoes were all wet and squishy inside. maybe that's what saved me from getting any hot spots or burns on the bottom of my feet. some people really did have burns on their feet ...true story. 

• I only pee'd one time the entire race and that was on the run IN A PORT-O-POTTY, not in my shorts, ok?

• Speaking of pee’ing, you know how sometimes a world record time in a running race has an asterisk to note that it was wind aided? Does it matter that when I pee’d on the bike, it was rain aided? Does it still count? I feel like maybe I cheated. Did I? 

• Leg hugs were in order on Saturday at the race expo. The leg hug thing is something that The Discombobulated Runner came up with last year and it was a hit so we decided to make it a ritual. Where she came up with this is still a mystery to me but I loved the idea. Here is how it works, when you meet a blogger buddy for the first time, you have to hug their leg and take a picture to prove it. They in turn have to hug your leg back with picture evidence. As crazy as it sounds, it became a hit so we continue the tradition. Here is my evidence:

• I hope everyone has a lovely memorial day weekend. I am doing 2 back to back centuries, one on Saturday and a completely different 100 mile route on Sunday. I will be well over 300+ miles for the week …yee-haw! 

• Have you noticed all the frozen yogurt places popping up? I do ♥ me some good frozen yogurt every now and then and my favorite flavor is ooey, gooey cinnamon bun. don’t judge me!

• Part of me is sad that florida 70.3 is over but the other part of me that needed a break from the hard core training is very happy. I like waking up and doing whatever I feel like doing. I'm sure I'll be itching to ramp it up again soon but for now, i shall enjoy the no structure schedule. 

oh crap, it's time to ride ...much love and peace out!

ironman 70.3 florida race report

the pelican bling

the swim

lots to say about the swim. i know without a doubt that had this swim not been rerouted, i would have knocked it out in 35 minutes. i'm not the betting kind but i would have put down some serious cash on that. unfortunately, due to a drought, the lake had a lot of shallow spots so the swim had to be reconfigured from the usual out, over and back rectangular pattern to an out, over, in, over, out, over, in. make sense? it was like the letter "W." in a nutshell, it was a royal mess of turns but it was what it was and i'd rather have a swim than no swim. i had no desire to do a run/bike/run. i'm not sure if all the turns had anything to do with this, but it was kinda rough out there. lots of contact. i thought with a wave start this would not be too much of an issue. i don't remember having that much grabbing, pulling, jostling for position at ironman florida and that was a mass start. can anyone explain this to me? 

as i was standing in the knee deep muck waiting for my wave to start (i was in the 6th wave), i had to laugh as i looked down at what i would describe as disgustingly dirty water. i've been spoiled swimming in bodies of water that you can actually see the bottom. oh well, my mantra is just swim like you are at the pool and that's what i tried to do despite the zig-zag mess of turns. 

swim time: 44:04

T1: 3:14

the bike

i love this part as most of you know. as usual, you have your wind, rough roads, and a few unsafe riders who nearly take you out (yes, i almost got taken out at mile 3). this course was hilly and it was hot. my goal going into this race was to not be as conservative on the bike as i have been in past races. i told myself to go all out and i pushed as hard as i could the entire 56 miles. i did my usual fig newtons early on, a gel at halfway, 2 bottles of water and a bottle of powerade with nuun. 

bike time: 2:41:53 / 20.76 avg.

T2: 2:36 

the run

i thought about this 13.1 miles all week and knew it was going to be hot. hotter than what i am used to running in. my strategy was to manage each mile, one at a time. i knew that there would be aid stations at approximately every mile, so i decided that i would quickly walk through each one. i made sure to grab whatever sport drink they had, water, ice, and a sponge and then upward and onward. let me just say that the magic trick to surviving a run when it is as hot as it was, is to dump ice in your jogbra. sorry guys, not sure what you can do to keep the ice in. maybe you can wear a manzere? how does Seinfeld always work his way into my posts? ok, back to the run ...so this is the routine i did every single mile and it worked like a charm. as much as i hate running in the hellish heat, i know it can be done successfully.

run time: 1:52:07 / 8:33 avg

total race time: 5:23:54

i am happy with my time. it placed me 8th in my age group out of 92. i will be back next year for sure. 

much love and peace out!

i did it!

before i even tell you what i did, let me take you back to 1997 as i was training for my first marathon. most of my training was done solo so i wasn't exposed to the typical runner's antics, like snot rockets, peeing out in the open, changing clothes in your car, etc ... fast forward 6 months to January 1998, to the start of the disney marathon, my first marathon. i was in total shock for the first mile or two as i saw men and women just running off to the side and relieving themselves and not even being discrete about it. i thought to myself, oh my god i would never do that and to this day i haven't, but, let me clarify. i can pee outside just not in the wide open or while people can see me. in order to pee, you need to relax, and just knowing i can be seen, makes me tense up so forget about being able to go. give me a tree or wall to hide behind and i'll let it flow.

****side note****

to all of my non-athletic friends, my family, my beautiful husband (hi honey! sorry i couldn't tell you to your face that i did this while we were riding), who may read this, i know you may be slightly appalled at first when you read the rest of this post but all the cool kids are doing it, so why can't i? isn't that a title of an album??

back to the story ...so over the last couple of years that i've been doing tri's, i have had many conversations with my compadres via email, twitter, and facebook about peeing while you are riding your bike, specifically while in a race. this really is a common topic among us tri-geeks. 95% of them encouraged me to DO IT! they even sent me instructions and tips on how to go about it. imagine that! so my excuse is that my friends made me do it. if you'd like to read some more humor on this particular subject, check out this article HERE.

not only did i pee on my bike once, but i did it twice. i think riding in the rain had something to do with it. fortunately, i wore my road shoes and not my tri shoes. raise your hand if you know what an underpass of an interstate smells like, where all the homeless people gather.  unfortunately, my road shoes now smell like this. good news though ...based on the most recent fabreeze commercials, this should not be a problem, right? fabreeze can kill the odor of dead fish and decomposing bodies according to the commercial. 

a little sunshine and a lot of fabreeze should cure the stink, right?

ok, enough of the pee talk, let's move on to more important stuff like lots of fun things going on this weekend like IRONMAN TEXAS. i want to wish Jason at CTER  and Heidi an awesome race! you both will have so many stalkers sending you good race mojo the entire day and we are all there with you. tomorrow is YOUR day!

here in florida, we have the FLORIDA Ironman 70.3 in haines city going on. what makes it a little more special is that Lance Armstrong will be there racing, which i think is pretty cool. i'm looking forward to meeting Summer, a blogger that is like my long lost little sister. you'd think based on all of our email and text messages that we've known each other our whole lives. i also get to watch JC (not my JC) and Jenny rock their first 70.3! and lastly, i have to settle a bet with this guy on Sunday ...i'll be coming for you on the bike mister! a great weekend indeed.

KC bib#425 and Mandy reporting for duty on Sunday!

much love and peace out!

shop til ya drop

i hate to go shopping! ever since i was a kid, i hated it. be it groceries, clothes, furniture, and especially christmas shopping. there is one exception though ...i love to shop online, especially on ebay. i have an eye for awesome deals and i wait like a predatory bird, watching and waiting until the last 15 seconds and then i pounce on it! deal done, i got the winning bid!

within the last year or two, i have bought 3 killer bike frames on ebay. 2 were road bike frames, which the J-man has built up into fabulous racing machines and the other is my beloved cannondale, atom green raven, a mountain bike frame, which is still in the planning phases. i keep telling him he needs to do this for a living. i swear he is that good! and a straight up perfectionist at that. sometimes it drives me crazy. but i digress ...

last week i got bit by the ebay shopping bug (AGAIN!) and found some SAAAWHEEET deals. check it out:

pearl iZUMi tri top, new with tags from Wheat Ridge Cyclery in Colorado. got it for $22 flat with free S & H.
i was sad they didn't have any matching shorts left.

 

this beauty should be in my hands by the end of the week. picked it up for $45 total.

sugoi tri top and bottom from Keswick Cycles in Pennsylvania for $50 w/free S & H. i already wore it on a 72 mile ride in the hills on saturday and LOVE it!

if you'd like me to be your personal shopper, please contact me, provide me with your credit card number and a wish list and i will gladly shop for you and i'll do it for free!

much love and peace out!

sorta kinda wordless wednesday

someone stole my blogging mojo! i don't know where it went to and i have no idea how i'm going to get it back but i'm working on it. in my defense, i did have a huge insurance exam that i've been studying for since january and finally took the exam yesterday, so maybe my mojo will return soon.

in the meantime, i ordered a case of creative juices, so when that arrives, i should be one mean, lean blogging machine. yeah, right!

the good news is, no one has stolen my training mojo and i am so very excited to be racing next month along side (ok, not really along side but you know what i mean) Lance Armstrong. should be fun!

gotta roll, my bike is calling me!

much love and peace out!

february from hell

that is the month of february going down the toilet!

a lot of you emailed me and texted me last month while i was on my disappearing act tour and i'd like to say thank you for checking in with me. that was very kind of you and much appreciated. so you wanna know what happened? i'm not even sure where to begin really so i'm going to break it down into the good, the bad, the sad and the ugly but not necessarily in that order, ok?

THE GOOD:
i decided somewhere back in late december, early january that my running was going so well that why waste it, so i found a marathon to do. one that was close to home, fairly flat, and no fuss (meaning, not a huge crowded mess of runners like Disney for example). my goal? qualify for boston, which relatively speaking, should have been in the bag easily. i only needed to run a 3:45 or better. i can't remember the last time i ran a marathon over that time, so you can see why i was so sure of myself. i wasn't being cocky at all. all of my long runs were spot on and i was feeling like a million bucks.

THE BAD:
friday, feb 2nd, 2 days before marathon day, i swam that morning before work and felt perfectly fine. i got to work at my normal time and noticed throughout the day that i had an annoying, dry cough. nothing that was alarming to me at all. i had no cold like symptoms and i never felt out of sorts. next day, saturday, i did an easy run and went to swim. again with no major issues except for that same annoying, dry cough. on my way home, i stopped at walmart and bought some thera-flu and zicam just in case i needed it.

we left for melbourne around 2 in the afternoon on saturday so i could get to the expo to pick up my goodie bag, race shirt and bib before they closed. on the drive there, i noticed that i started getting chills. now, if you know me, you will know i am ALWAYS hot. i like my environment cold. this was not the case on this 83* day. i was freezing and i couldn't stop shaking. luckily we had 2 towels in the J-man's truck so i covered my legs and upper body with them and felt much better. i still didn't feel bad at all, just had chills.

i went to bed around 9 that night, again, still not feeling crappy at all. i still had chills all night and woke up a few times, drenched in sweat. no big deal i tell myself.

THE UGLY:
i wake up on race day and do my usual routine. shower, eat, drink a tiny bit of coffee, get dressed, etc ...
the J-man asked how i felt as i was starting to cough a little more than the last few days. i told him the truth ...i felt fine and that i was going to go out there, run the marathon and get my boston qualifying time. the drive to the race start was uneventful. as i was waiting for the race to start, the J-man came up to me and looked me straight in the eyes and asked me if i felt okay enough to do the race. i looked him straight in the eyes and said, "i've got this." as in, i've got this BQ, no prob, kiss-kiss, see ya at the finishline.

bang! the race starts right on time. i tell myself to not get all caught up in the 1/2 marathoners pace and to hold my "easy" pace. first five miles was like i was on a treadmill. every mile split was an 8:20. i thought there was something wrong with my garmin. rut-roh, mile six and i see an 8:45 and now i feel really, really sick. what the hell? by mile 8, i pulled out the white flag and surrendered. by surrendered, i mean, i knew the marathon was out of the question. i told myself to just finish it up with the half marathon and call it a day. yes, i was pissed off. all of this hard work and nothing to show for it. the last 5.2 miles were hell. i really didn't think i was going to even make it back to finish the half. i did something i never do in a race. i walked (gasp!). i had no choice at this point but to go into survival mode. i saw the J-man at mile 11 as he was about to take my picture. i yelled NO PICTURES! i also told him that my day was over and to meet me back at the finish. by the way, i've yet to check the camera to see if he took any pictures that day. i would rather just forget the entire weekend. there was no way i was going to leave without the cool spinning medal, even if it was just the half marathon. thankfully, the medal for the half and full were almost identical except for the ribbon. i ended up finishing in 1:57:35 ...pitiful! it made me even more sick to see that time. ok, let me clarify, finishing in just under 2 hours isn't horrible, but for me, based on my normal race pace in a half, it's horrible.

THE REALLY BAD AND UGLY:
as soon as i was done, i grabbed a water, declined the official finishers picture with my medal, and immediately found a bench to sit down on. i had nothing left. i was almost dead. i drank some water, coughed my head off, then gathered myself up to head back to the car. we went back to the hotel so i could shower, then we headed home. i slept all the way home (2 hours). as soon as we got home, i grabbed my bags out of the car, threw them in the office, changed into sleeping cloths and went straight to bed and i slept like Snow White ...but only for 2.5 weeks. LOL!

oh look! it's the J-man and Snow White!

actually, what ended up happening was the first week, the doctor thought i had pneumonia and was treating me for that with 3 different meds and a shot in the butt cheek. after a week of that, i was getting worse, not better, so back to the doctor. this time i was scared. i thought for sure i would get there and they would send me straight to the hospital. thankfully, they didn't. the doctor did however, change his diagnosis to the bubonic plague severe bronchitis and the flu and gave me 2 more meds and yet another shot in my tushy. let me just say that i have never in my life been so sick. not EVER! what a freakin' nightmare.

THE SAD:
i had to skip running the inaugural st. pete rock and roll half marathon, which meant, i didn't get to drop it down low with Flo Rida after the race. boo-hiss on that. thankfully, i did get to run the gasparilla half marathon but i was nowhere near race shape thanks to the ebola virus. yes, i was a bit sad and frustrated to not be able to open up all cylinders this year but i'm okay with it now. the medal is to die for too. i would have crawled the entire way for that medal too.

THE GOOD:
all in all, i feel so much better now. i am not 100% YET but getting closer everyday. i will admit that i was extremely frustrated for the last few weeks because i felt like my progress was soooo slow, my breathing was like a 3 pack a day smoker and Lord knows i am not the most patient person. but now i look at my almost month long hiatus as a much needed vacation for my mind, body and soul. albeit, a vacation that was forced upon me but one that obviously was much needed. that's how i chose to look at it.

i officially began my hard core training for Florida 70.3 so watch out world, i'm on my way back.

much love and peace out!

just wanted to let you know ...

i promise to update my blog this week. i had a february straight out of hell. that is all.

as a side note, i'm not feeling the wordpress thing so much yet so rather than not blog at all,  i am going to stay here on blogger until i have the time to really understand wordpress a little better. in other words, wordpress is frustrating me and i'm finding myself avoiding blogging all together. thanks for reading.

much love and peace out!