Sleeping In

Mr. Decaf when he was little and cute

This morning I had no energy to get up out of bed and go to the gym to run on the Treadmill. Three miles, a treadmill and being sleepy tired do not add up to be a good workout (in my mind at least). So I took a rest day and slept a little more.

Should be good to go tomorrow morning - SWIM TIME!

Treadmill Fun

I'm thinking that I would enjoy the treadmill more if there were classes that were like this...

How To...

take off your wetsuit.

Okay, so this isn't so much for educational purposes as it is for the entertainment factor. The kid that is running around her is a crack-up!

Enjoy!


Taking Off Wetsuit

What's On Your Mind?

Yup, I've got triathlon on my brain...already thinking about next season! I don't think that it can be here soon enough...SIGH.

I have reflecting quite a bit on my two triathlons that I did this summer and I am pretty convinced that I like them A LOT! 

My big goal was to do better on my swim at StumpTown and that has been achieved! I can't believe that I cut 4 minutes out of my time...so EXCITED - there is hope for my swimming skills yet! I gained so much more confidence the second time around. I am already thinking about preparing to do a Sprint Tri next year, which just means that the swim is a half mile instead of a quarter mile.

So I know what I need to do until next spring...more pool time to build up my endurance! When I'm in the pool I usually end up losing track of how many laps I have done. Then one day, not too long ago, I arrived at the pool to see a guy in the first lane with a bunch of pennies at the end of the lane I didn't get it at first. After a couple of minutes it was very clear - he was using those pennies to "count" his laps. Swim a lap, move a penny from the bag to a pile. SO clever! I'm going to borrow that technique and use it to keep track of my laps...we always have lots of pennies! I'm thinking I'm going to start with 10 and time myself and go from there. My goal for this fall and winter is to start adding time and getting myself to 30 minutes of almost continuous swimming. I say almost continuous because my asthma tends to slow me down a little and it's so easy to stop and rest while pool swimming.

While I work on my endurance, I think I will need to start training to do Bilateral breathing. Bilateral breathing is alternating breathing while swimming freestyle on the right and left side instead of continually breathing to one side only. This is a timing thing and I think I'll need lots of time to practice as I am a right side breather. During the StumpTown event I swam more freestyle and was also able to do my breathing every stroke along with every fourth stroke. It worked out pretty well and it was nice to switch things up a little. Always something to work on! 

Doing triathlons will be my big challenge for a long time. I thought I would just stick to duathlons, but I finally realized that I really don't enjoying running TWO times in one event. Yeah, it's a challenge, but it's more unpleasant than doing all three sports! So really, getting back into swimming was probably the best decision I ever made...and I never thought that I would enjoy it so much!

Looking forward to doing a Sprint Triathlon sometime in the Summer of 2012!

Time to start...

Planning for next year's events! And training too...So much fun!!!

Yesterday was my second novice tri and my goal was to have a better swim time and I beat my June swim time by just over 4 minutes! I think that's pretty cool considering I haven't been that diligent about swimming since Blue Lake, but I at least was able to get into open water a few times since then.

There were fewer people in the Novice group, which was nice, but also a little annoying as they were novices (like I'm not) and it showed! I know that there were a couple of gals behind me that were freaking out in the water, so my goal was to get away from them! Another thing about this swim was that I actually hung with the group for a lot longer than at Blue Lake and I really didn't like that so much. I REALLY need to join the swim group that meets at Klineline, that certainly wouldn't hurt. I think I just need to get over myself and just do it!

So, 17 minutes after we started I'm out of the water and making my way to transition - after looking at my watch I'm pretty convinced that I did better this time around :)

Transition #1 was more than 7 minutes, stupid wet suit. It took me a while to peel that thing off! I'm going to have to work on that.

The bike course is exactly the same as the Blue Lake and All Womens event...same with the run course. So really nothing to report there other than I was consistent with my times in each one. I kind of took it easy on the bike, but that would not have mattered because the run was soooo bad!

What a blast! I love the challenge of doing something new and different. My future goal is to do multisport events well.

What events will I do next year? Probably Blue Lake and possibly StumpTown...I think I need to throw one more in the mix for the fun of it! Time to start planning and training!

Next up, Run Like Hell - Portland on October 23...zombies baby!

Duathlons are...

MUCH easier to pack for! All I need for a duathlon are my bike and shoes...and clothes for post race.

BUT

This is just a part of the stuff that I pack for triathlon...

Just in case you are wondering the following are the items that I have laid out so far to pack up - 

Race Shirt

Swim Cap

Swim Goggles

Body Glide

Flip Flops

Running Shoes

Cycling Shoes

Bike Helmet

NUUN

ShotBloks

Transition Mat

Race Number/Belt

A couple of optional hygiene items to get the lake cooties off of me

My wet suit is hanging up in the hall and I still need to find my race shorts and gather up some clothes to wear afterwards. Until tomorrow evening I'll just let things sit while I check and re-check my items against the list and then eliminate items that I probably won't need - I tend to bring more stuff than I really need. 

I already have my bike ready to load onto the rack...so I'm good there. Oooh...maybe I should consider a my CO2 inflator and an extra tube. This would be the time that I get a flat tire! 

Tom will be an event volunteer Sunday morning which means he needs to be at Blue Lake at 5:30 to check in at the Volunteer Tent. That means that I'll be traveling to Blue Lake extra early - woo hoo. I think it will be okay, I'll just get lots of sleep the night before and then I'll just rest when we get there. When I am allowed to set up in the transition area I'll just mosey my stuff over there and chill until race time. I just hope that he isn't too far away when I need to pull on my wet suit...it is possible that I'll have to ask someone to help me in zipping up my suit....UGH!

Looking forward to my second tri...after I'm done with that I'll have about 6 weeks to prepare for Run Like Hell!