Gyrokinesis

Last week I was looking through a magazine and there was a feature on Gyrokinesis - a set of easy (on your body) workout for flexibility and core strength. After trying out the routine in the magazine I started looking around on the internet for more information.

This clip is from Live with Regis & Kelly with a Gyrokinesis Master...Regis is annoying, but it's a good routine!

ZOOM-ZOOM Part 2

I got my birthday gift...a little early...yay me!

We'll see how much of a difference this makes...I read somewhere that the bars gave a rider a 1.5 mph faster time...that would push my average up to the high 19s. We have skipped out on the last two time trials now and I am not sure that next Thursday's weather will be much better. The 10 day forecast shows showers all next week which will include Blue Lake on the 5th... :(

Got the bike set up on the trainer to make the adjustments. I'm supposing that I will not keep the aerobars on my Fuji and will most likely mount them on my Trek road bike after Andrew outgrows it and it is returned "home". I'm entertaining the idea of converting my Trek into a tri bike as much as possible...probably should do research on that first. Although, I could mess around with the seat post height and saddle position so that it will work fine until I decide what I really want to do. I really don't know what to do - the guys at the shop would have some valuable insight...hmmmm, another visit to Performance!

Here's looking to some faster times during the weekly time trials!

ZOOM-ZOOM!

ZOOM-ZOOM

A while I ago I posted this.

Now, I would like to say that I got the cool thing in the first picture...

Oh, you didn't go back to the post. Go ahead, I'll wait...

Welcome back!

Yeah, so no new slick TT bike for this girl - but the more likely option #2 as an early birthday gift. I kind of spoiled the whole surprise of it all by taking a day off with Tom...enough said. So, we left my bike at the shop yesterday and Tom brought it home today...evidently my bike is looking pretty slick now.

I was hoping to ride in tonight's time trial, but I probably should check out the set up and make some adjustments before I go anywhere to try to tear up any TT course! I'm so PSYCHED!

Imagine if I got a new Tri-bike...oooh...let's not go down THAT road. Not yet anyway ;)

There WILL be a follow-up...

17 days....

YIKES!

I was feeling okay about Blue Lake not being so far away. I don't know why I'm starting to feel a little anxious over this now...it's a mystery.

This morning I was at Starbucks enjoying a Misto and my book when along came the associate principal at the Vancouver Arts & Academics school. I had forgotten that I challenged him months ago to train for a sprint tri way. I offered to keep him on task, but then fell off the face of the earth. Anyway, he reported to me that he had done his first tri last weekend and felt alright about it. He posted a decent time for a first tri and he mentioned that he was looking forward to Blue Lake in a couple of weeks.

Then it hit me...the Du is just over two weeks away...and I've been in training light mode this week. I doubt that we'll get to ride the TT tomorrow evening (stupid rain) so we'll have to make sure that we do a good Brick on Saturday. This week is the big one...a 15 min run, 45 min ride and then another 15 min run...YIKES! I don't know why I'm freaking out now...we are doing this for fun!

Yeah, that's it...FUN. I need to find the fun in this again... 

RUN-RIDE-RUN?

More Rest

Today should have been a run day, but I decided to rest another day and hit the treadmill in the morning. Am feeling a little tired anyway, so two rest days in a row isn't a bad idea. Here are my run and ride charts...just a little update. I'm not a slacker...no much anyway.

Three weeks and counting...

This week has been pretty full of running and riding. Did something each day this week including today. With the Du 3 weeks from today I'm feeling pretty good about how things are progressing.

Thursday's Time trial went pretty well and today's Brick was better than I imagined it would be. Last week we shorted our time on the bikes, but more than made up for it today. 50 minutes and 12+ miles later we arrived home to transition to our 20 minute run. Legs weren't feeling too bad - which was surprising - and we ran 1.64 miles. That's way off what I need to run in that amount of time, but come race day the adrenaline will help and being in a race atmostphere always helps with speed. The only thing I need to do is not blow up to fast in the first run.

This week I got an email for the TriRock series. This tri will be at Vancouver Lake Park (of all places) and I am entertaining the idea of doing it. This event would be the motivation I need to get into the pool and start swimming, but with a fee of $115 it seems a bit much given our limited resources right now. This is just the motivation I need to make sure that I start training for Blue Lake 2011 and do either the Tri-It or the Sprint Tri a decision that I can make later.

Before I can do anything else, I need to get through Blue Lake 2010! It will be here fast!

Run-Ride-Run bay-bee!

Mini TT Report

So last night was the weekly Vancouver Bicycle Club Time Trial. Tom and I worked it out so that my car would be here at work so I could bike commute yesterday (can't waste a gorgeous day) and then Tom rode and met me here at work to rack up his bike on the car and off to the Port Offices. Even with our earlier than usual arrival we were only a few places ahead of our position from last week #21 - me and #22 - Tom. I have no idea how we got #'s 1 & 2 the very first time we tried time trialing. 

Things that were different this week...

- more bikes with drop handlebars. TT bikes are cool, but not exactly practical...so I'm hoping for aerobars for my birthday. The fact there there were more people with drop handlebars made me feel more normal than usual. I knew that these were people that would not be passing me.

- a couple of local teams training for Team Time Trials (North River and another team out of Portland).

- Tom got a flat about a mile from the finish. Tom decided to ride without his seat pack and my remark was that he was feeling a little confident that he wouldn't get a flat...OOOPS...did I jinx him?

- I did better than last week. I felt a little slow, but it seems that I kept my speed up around 18 on the way to the turn around around 18-19 on the way back. I may have lost a few seconds when Tom thought he could get me to stop to retrieve the key FOB after he flatted...I'm lucky he is understanding and patient with me :)

We'll see how the weather looks next Thursday - the 10 forecast on weather.com shows showers all week. We might get lucky and get to ride again. If not, we have many weeks of time trials ahead of us this summer!

I like riding fast!

Ridin' FAST...

So obsessed! It's Thursday again and tonight is the VBC Time Trial! I'm pretty sure that I won't beat last week's time, but that's not the point. It's 10 miles of fast riding FUN! Hoping that the wind will cooperate...no wind, no wind...no wind!

Will update later with an unofficial time...IF I remember to un-click my computer. Oh, check out the weekly snapshot of times at http://www.vancouverbicycleclub.com/...my times are listed under TWO names.

****Update****

Posted another faster time over the previous ride...32:58! For some reason I thought I was slower, but I just wasn't remembering my time from the previous week...WOO HOO!

On the down side, Tom ended up getting a flat with 1 mile to go... :(

Less than a month away...

Nothing new to report, but it has been a while since I posted my run chart. I'm liking all the colors! I'm probably doing more tempo type runs than I should, but with the training that I've been engaging in, the runs are definitely not easy and I certainly haven't gone for a long run for a while. Felt a little lazy today so I opted to do a 30 minute run/walk on the treadmill. I'm starting to get when I should slow it down a little...it only took 3 years! I don't feel overly tired now, so that's a good thing. Now all I have to do is make sure that this week I engage myself in easy training and not overdo it...good luck to me!

So, my goal is to train easy this week - Running on Monday & Wednesday; Bike Commuting on Tuesday, Thursday & Friday, Time Trial Thursday after work and a Brick on Saturday. I'm going easy...really! Well, except for the Time Trial - it was fun trying to keep Tom away for the first 5 miles!

26 days and counting...until we run-ride-run!

Big Chain Ring Gooood....

 (Cycling season is not going as planned...stupid rain)

Riding Time Trials is FUN...well, if riding all out as fast as you can like a fool is fun for you. For some reason, me and my mister like time trialing. Riding against the clock trying to beat your last time, yeah that's fun.

So, last night Tom and I rode our second Vancouver Bicycle Club time trial for the year and we were #26 & #27. Tom gives me the courtesy of wearing the number ahead of him which in actuality makes me the carrot. Not that I have a problem with being a carrot, but this is a time trial and as I mentioned above, in a time trial riding like a fool is key. With about 50 riders last night we were about mid-way through the line up which is nice so that there would be about an equal number starting before and after us. So, really, not too many behind that would pass and those that did pass were riding TT bikes....cheaters ;)

Now there is a little bit of a ritual that goes into getting ready to start. One of the VBC members grabs a hold of the saddle and steadies the bike as the rider gets situated...resetting the computer, clicking into the pedals...listening to the countdown. Ugh...the 30 countdown...in 30 seconds I could fall down just waiting!

Anyway, two weeks ago I started in my small chain ring because the wind was whippin' pretty good and I needed to be able to spin more...about 3 miles into the course I decided that maybe the big ring would bring better results and it did. It is all about what can bring you more SPEED and the small ring was not cuttin' it. So, last night I decided since the wind wasn't so bad that I would start in the big ring just for the sake of getting going out there and fast since Mr. Tom would be starting 30 seconds behind me.

I LOVE THE BIG RING!

After a mile or so a couple of people passed, neither were Tom...then another rider or two...still no Tom. A HA! There was some distance between us and there was no way that I was going to let the gap get smaller so I kept on pushing until the turn around. Tom was right behind me at the turn around, but he didn't lap me until after...I WIN! It was fun trying to keep far enough ahead which would make Tom work harder at catching me...hehehe...so fun! Later he would admit that he felt sluggish. We determined that since he had forgotten his computer that he really didn't know where he was as far as speed or distance, so a little bit of a disadvantage. Next time might be different, but we'll see...

In the end my unofficial time was 33:10 - about a minute and a half faster than last week.

So yeah, Big Ring is Good!

Clearing?

IF the weather forecast sticks Tom and I may be heading to the Port of Vancouver to do the weekly time trial. Last week's weather was iffy, so we decided that there is a long season ahead of us...there is always next week. 

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10-Day Forecast for Vancouver, WA (98665)

NEW: Larger Radar Maps & No Ads

			High / Low (°F)	Precip. %
Tonight May 03		Showers	41°	50 %
Tue May 04		Showers	51°/39°	60 %
Wed May 05		Few Showers	57°/40°	30 %
Thu May 06		Partly Cloudy	68°/46°	20 %
Fri May 07		Partly Cloudy	65°/48°	20 %
Sat May 08		Partly Cloudy	63°/48°	10 %
Sun May 09		Mostly Cloudy	62°/45°	0 %
Mon May 10		Few Showers	64°/48°	30 %
Tue May 11		Showers	64°/49°	60 %
Wed May 12		Mostly Sunny	66°/51°	10 %
Last Updated May 3 04:14 p.m. PT