Today is my day off of training and the first one I felt like I deserved.
Last week’s training:
Mon Swim 2000.00 Yards 45:00
Run 3.00 Miles 33:00
Tue Swim 2600.00 Yards 52:30
Wed Run 4.15 Miles 40:25
Thu Cycle 21.00 Miles 1:33:00
Fri Swim 2200.00 Yards 45:00
Sat Cycle 36.48 Miles 3:24:00
Sun Run 6.05 Miles 1:03:00
Total time – ~9.5 hours GO ME!
Next week – more training and more brick workouts.
I went to a 5K/Half Marathon event today to cheer on my team members. I had briefly considered running the 5K but my legs are pretty worn out and there isn’t much point in paying $30 to have a non PR 5K so I restricted my activities to cheerleading which was fine.
The thing that happened today that was baffling is that a woman tried to cheat – big time.
When the first 1/2 Marathon runners started coming in the race director came over and said he was having a race director’s worst nightmare. A group of women had reported that they saw a woman jump on to the course at about mile 8 – in front of all the other women running. He wanted some of the first women from our team to let him know if they saw it, too.
One woman thought she had but another had said that she was pretty sure everyone in front of her had been at the start. Long story short, the woman who really did win also saw the cheater jump in and there was some other confirmation and that was that – DQ’d.
It’s one thing to jump in to get a better time – a weird thing and not one that would satisfy me but not the same thing as jumping in the race for the overall women’s win!! What must someone’s ethics be to try a stunt like that? Trust me when I tell you everyone was hoping she had jumped off the course to puke or take a pee or something but that just wasn’t the case – she was going for someone else’s glory. Ick.
I was planning on doing my long ride on Sunday but one of my riding partners couldn’t make it so we changed to today – why not? The plan had been to climb the back side of the Berkeley Hills and go to the start of my season opener triathlon, The Golden Bear, and then test drive the course. Alas – such was not to be.
My riding partner Cindy wasn’t crazy about that idea and my legs were pretty tired from my smokin hot run Wednesday night followed by my ride on Thursday. Friday I swam. We decided to climb up the front side of the hills (front and back are totally arbitrary, btw – I just made that up) because we had done that before and knew what to expect. This was my second time making this climb and I didn’t think I could do it and REALLY wanted to talk Cindy out of it. That Cindy is a wiley one, though and she said, “lets just get there and see how it goes. You just keep pedaling and pretty soon you’re there.” Uh huh.
My recollection from the last time is that I thought the first part of the ride from the bottom of Wildcat Canyon Rd. to Inspiration Point would be really hard and I thought that it WAS the climb. When we did it a year ago I remember thinking it was no big deal. What I didn’t know about then was that we were just warming up and there was this whole OTHER hill to climb. That’s the part I didn’t think I could manage because I remembered it as being excrutiating.
As I remembered, the first part was fine – no big whoop (the part that is the same for both rides). The onl y problem was that the further up the hill we got the wetter and foggier it became. We passed Inspiration Point and kept going with me thinking I would beg to turn around at Lake Anza. My thighs were like that shirt in the Tide-to-Go ad that has the talking stain on it and the stain was sayiing “No freakin’ way! Stop! – No No! Turn Back! We’re Tired! No can Do!” – in stereo, no less. My mouth stayed clamped shut, though and on we rode.
Then we got to the part I remembered as being the beginning of the hard part. I just kept pedaling and it just kept getting wetter and foggier and the visibility went down, down, down. And we just kept going. I remember thinking at one point, “where is that really steep part that I don’t think I can manage” and then I remember looking to my right and thinking, “isn’t this just about the top?” Not that we could see anything but a whited out fog bank but there are some logs and stuff to keep the cars from driving off the edge and there was a water tank and I sort of remembered that part.
There was a possible turn off we stopped at but I was feeling okay so we just kept pedaling and it just kept getting wetter and the visibility went down, down, down unti you couldn’t see 30 feet ahead of you. We were headed to a second possible turn off and when we got there and were thinking about what to do a lady in a HEYOOGE MBZ with NO lights on came puttering by. Decision made! We didn’t know how near the top we were but at that point the thought of going down the other side in zero visibility with reckless drivers on the road lost all appeal.
We went across the street and headed down a road that is closed to cars in the winter and that is awesome! I was screaming down that hill, for me (is 30 mph screaming?). I had to exercise some caution because the road was wet but I pretty much let ‘er rip. Once we got down that hill we could see again and were very happy not to feel so invisible. What I didn’t know was what happened to that super steep part.
Here are the 2 elevation maps from last year and this year:
As you can see – we were at the top. There was no more steep part except that one extra climb that comes after some down. We could have come down any which way and it would been fine with me and my nattering thighs except for that part where no one could see us. I think we made the right move.
The real lesson here is that if you don’t know where you are, if you can’t see up the hill very far and if you have a terrible memory you can do stuff you thought was way too hard. I’ve sent my thighs off to stand in the corner and think about that while the rest of me mows through the kitchen.
Various people in my race club sponsor weekly events. There are Saturday rides and Sunday Ladies rides and Wednesday night runs and now that the days are longer, Thursday night rides are back. I really needed to get on my pony and go but I was pretty intimidated to go out with this particular group. However, faced with the choice of spending quality time with Coach Troy and going for a ride on a beautiful evening I had to at least entertain the latter.
I sent email to the guy who was leading and asked about the ride. He described it as a ride up ‘Dog Hill’ and I really needed to understand EXACTLY what that meant. He told me it was no big whoop and they used it most of the time to practice riding while staying in the saddle so I thought, “fine – I’ll go”.
I left work early yesterday because I was so exhausted – just fatigued. I’ve had a lot of that lately but I have not had the nasty crud that is ruining everyone else’s life (that sound you hear is me, knocking on wood) so I assume my body is fighting it off. Anyhow, I came home and lay down for a power nap. Then the alarm went off the conversation in my head went like this:
Gallant: Get up – time to go for a ride
Goofus: Oh no – I’m so tired. I don’t think I should go
Gallant: Get up – put the bike in the car
Goofus: I don’t think so – I think I have a sore throat and besides, I’ll get dropped like a bad date in the first 2 miles
Gallant: PUT THE BIKE IN THE CAR!!!
Goofus: I can’t do it. I can’t – too humiliating
Gallant: Just put the effing bike in your effing car and start driving!
Goofus: Oh man.. oh no…. oh God… PLEASE DON’T MAKE ME GO!
Gallant: PUT.THE.BIKE.IN.THE.CAR!
Goofus: Okay fine – I’ll put the bike in the car.
And I did. I put the bike in the car along with the helmet, the shoes, leg warmers, arm warmers and gloveS. I had on shorts and a short sleeve cycling jersey and a wind breaker.
I just about cooked in my car. It was pretty warm out.
When I got there the first person to greet me was a woman who had been recommended to me as a coach. Great. Most of the the rest of the riders have done Ironman. Oh boy…. But I got on the bike and I rode. I kept up with them for a while, too and I thought “Stud!” But then we hit a hill and away they went and there I was – way behind everyone and all alone. And you know what? I didn’t care. I just rode the fastest I could ride.
Dog Hill was not so bad and I realized that a year ago I would have granny geared it up the entire time. As it was I used the small chain ring twice in 4 miles of climbing – go me! Dog Hill was an out and back and just before I got to the end the group started coming back the other way. They were gracious enough to claim they had just gotten there themselves (fer shrue) and told me to go ahead and get to the turn around. That was very nice.
The way back was mostly down and I mostly kept up with people. It was really fun! And I rode. And Coach Troy will just have to find some other blind date.
As I went to bed last night I thought “I’ll get up and spend some quality time with coach Troy on my trainer – if I get up in time” This morning I got up way too late for coach Troy or anything other than getting ready for work and I thought WHAT DID I SAY??!!! Unbelievable. What kind of an athlete qualifies the plan with ‘if I have time’. I guess I STILL need to HTFU!
I did go for a run this evening and managed 4.15 miles in 40:25 for a sub 10 min/mile training run – go me!
In other news I have Barbies and stuffed animals in my family room again. I can’t bear to put them back in the dark, hidey hole I extracted them from last week. I want my little Pirates baaaaccckkkk!!!
On a positive note I get my own little girlies weekend after next. Both of them are coming home – Yay! I can hardly wait.
I had me some visitors this weekend, matey! A Pirate and her First Mate and some wee Pirate Lassies. Cutest little Pirate babes in the world! We ate great food and toasted smarshmallows to make s’mores and played. The wee little lassies set the table, too! I even got to hoist one on to me lap to read her a story. Ahhhhh… t’was a pirate’s life for me.
The occasion was a race that did not happen but I’ll let DPR tell that story should she choose to do so. There’s a lesson to be learned so I hope she does.
On Sunday DPR and I went and navigated the high seas of the local open space and soon found ourselves thigh high in grass with no trail in site. Ahhhh… t’was lovely. Fortunately this is the very over developed Bay Area where you are never far from civilization so all we had to do to get back to the trails was to navigate away from the houses. Our ‘run’ looked like this:
No matter! We had fun and got 6 miles logged and all was well. Very well indeed. In the process of having the pleasure of her company and the company of her family I inherited some fudge (red pepper and pinon), a fabulous red hat and a shirt. Hopefully it won’t be long before it all happens again.
And that reminds me – are any of you planning on running the Bay to Breakers?
First of all, although I like Obama I voted for Clinton.
Second of all I know a lot of you are Republicans and I love you anyhow.
This, however, makes me sick and I think everyone needs to be very aware of the way “news” is presented. Keep in mind that John McCain has been endorsed by John Hagee who claimed that Hurricane Katrina was God’s punishment for allowing a gay pride parade in New Orleans. The news isn’t too upset about that, though.
The news is supposed to be informative, not biased. Those days are long gone and will only come back if we the people demand a lot less of this behavior and a lot more fact based, hysteria free reporting that actually involve original thought, not just a paraphrase of what the other guy said.
First of all, although I like Obama I voted for Clinton.
Second of all I know a lot of you are Republicans and I love you anyhow.
This, however, makes me sick and I think everyone needs to be very aware of the way “news” is presented. Keep in mind that John McCain has been endorsed by John Hagee who claimed that Hurricane Katrina was God’s punishment for allowing a gay pride parade in New Orleans. The news isn’t too upset about that, though.
The news is supposed to be informative, not biased. Those days are long gone and will only come back if we the people demand a lot less of this behavior and a lot more fact based, hysteria free reporting that actually involve original thought, not just a paraphrase of what the other guy said.
A couple months ago I was driving to work listening to the local classic rock radio station (KFOG) and “The Fog Files” was playing. The Fog Files is the news guy’s (Peter Finch) feature show. This one was about a Silicon Valley Venture Capitalist who also happens to be a middle aged woman who struggles with weight – just like me! She was driving to work one day, listening to the radio (harmonic convergence!) and thinking about a meeting she would soon be attending. She knew that at this meeting there would be plate of cookies and she would eat them and then hate herself (more harmonic convergence!) and she wondered why it is that there are songs about loving and losing and getting the guy and getting dumped but not a single song about resisting cookies.
In that AHA moment she returned to that comfortable old aphorism – if you need something done right you have to do it yourself and so she did. First she wrote some song lyrics to express her feelings about weight and food. Then she spoke with some industry people about how to go about getting these songs produced and they told her to hire top talent in the music writing and vocals arena. Being that she’s a Silicon Valley Venture Capitalist she has more money than fat so that’s what she did.
Harmonic convergence entered my life yet again when I got an email a couple weeks later asking me if I’d like to review the CD. “Bring it on!” I said, I already heard about this on the radio.
So that’s the story behind the review of Skinny Songs by Heidi Roizan. And what about that review?
I admire Ms. Roizen for doing something positive about this cookie problem. Way to go! Clearly this has worked for you 
You look great, not to mention the fact that this has brought you face to face with Martha! I’m impressed! (see pic below)
As for the music – she did a smart thing by making some of them very country, a couple of them sort of hip-hopish and some more mainstream rock. The rhythm is set to workout speed so you can hear words of affirmation about what you are doing while you do it and that’s always a good thing. There are lyrics to remind you of why you really want to lose weight:
From “Who the Hell is That”
who the hell is that? ‘Cause it sure ain’t me!
how’d I get so fat? It’s a shame to see
something’s gone wrong with the photo quality
who the hell is that, cause it sure ain’t me
And lyrics to remind you that it’s all up to you and that you really want it and YOU CAN DO IT!
From “You Da Boss”
But you don’t need that piece of pie
Gotta let it go and pass you by
and I’m here to remind you why
’cause you want to be lookin’ and feelin’ fly
“You Got to Use it to Lose” is my particular fave but truth be told it’s the kind of exercise music that gets stuck in your head and just hangs around like post workout sock stink.
I’m not nuts about most of the music (I’m not a fan of country or hip hop) but I think the CD is a great idea and expect there are people out there for whom this collection would represent a huge source of motivation and assistance in the battle of the bulge. Although the marketing is clearly targeting women, many of the songs are sung by men so I think they could relate.
They have a line of shirts, too (look – it’s Martha!!) I find some of them offensive but when it comes to my body I’ve never had a very good sense of humor.
Bottom line – this CD isn’t really to my taste but I applaud her effort and I encourage anyone who does daily hand to mind combat with fattening food to check it out – it could be just what you have been looking for.
Does anyone have any experience with these shoes?
I am feeling the need for new cycling shoes. The ones I have are okay but I had no idea what I was doing when I bought them. I don’t really need new shoes but I got an ad for these today and I ♥ them
If you know anything about these shoes please speak up!
21st-century-mom.com 