The Fun Parts of IMLP

I think this picture from Friday, July 18 pretty much sums it up. It was taken on the deck of the awesome house I stayed in with Shelley and Cindy. Shelley and I are both going back to race IMLP in 2009, and we will be staying in the same house!!! We sort of established a tradition this time that whenever one of us was on deck and someone else was arriving at the house or just driving or walking within sight, we'd flash them. I know there were at least a few appreciative passersby, even if there wasn't much to see when I was the one flashing!

Shelley is a real Crackhead enabler, I have to say. The Hello Kitty panties are a gift from her to me last year, and the Barbie crown and earring set are from her to me this year. The Tootsie Roll socks are just socks I got for myself. In case you would like some for yourself, head to Joy of Socks. They have lots of cool socks, and bonus, they almost work as compression socks!

If you zoom in on the photo (and yes, I know you are doing that), you will see a series of reddish dots just above my right nipple. Those are from something or somethings that stung me on Tuesday, July 15 while doing my last ride before leaving for Lake Placid. Cindy calls them my bee stings, as opposed to my tits which are just normal mosquito bites. Sorry, but I've never had anything in that department! You'd think at least the bee stings or whatever they were would provide some enhancement, but NOOOOOOO.

Later this same evening, Shelley and I had a really nice dinner and some wine on the deck, and then we headed into downtown Lake Placid for a walk--about 1/2 mile from the house. I left my Barbie crown and earrings on since I was feeling rather festive. I'm pretty sure I got a number of strange looks, but I know I was all smiles. We went to visit a mutual friend at his hotel, but he wasn't there, and I guess his wife wasn't too appreciative of our visit or message, which probably came across as two drunk chics asking for her husband. Oh well--we were having fun!

The picture below (that I lifted from Shelley) was taken after Shelley and I had gone riding the same morning on the run course. I bought pirate socks for Shelley, Cindy and me, and we all had fun wearing them, but I can't tell you how much fun it was wearing them while riding! Shelley was also wearing streamers that I had given her, and we were quite the sight! Many of the people who were doing the race had their game faces on and were confused by the sight of us, but several athletes got the joke/fun aspect and would smile and give us high fives or other gestures of approval.





















I don't think I have ever had so much fun in my life, I mean really. Sure, I had my worst Ironman performance in 5 years, but I have put that aside to focus on all the great things that happened during the last week:

• I drove 850 miles straight by myself in 13.5 hours on Tuesday--from New York to home! This proved to me that I can do an Ironman and then do another Ironman of driving. You may think the drive was boring (OK, so I had to speed through Canada), but for some reason it was just another opportunity to apply my focus on something and get it done.
• I got to be a part of other athlete's successful days. Cindy rocked the course, and I am so happy for her! Other friends of mine did the same. So what if it didn't happen to me. And the best part is nobody (at least to my face) said anything remotely like "you suck" to me.
  
• I learned some do's and don'ts for riding and running in the rain. Obviously, if I ever have to do it again, it won't be such a big deal to me.
• I got to be taken care of for a few days. By good friends, and by total strangers. It was the best!
  
• I set a new PR for number of times I peed in a single day. It had to be well over 50 times!
• I think other than during the actual race, I spent more time laughing than doing anything else!

While yesterday morning was an emotional blowout for me (pretty normal post-IM crap), by yesterday evening I was already looking forward to my next adventures--NothingMan is coming up, and I've already got a secret hardcore schedule prepared for 2009 that is beginning to take shape.

In the meantime, I am still a bloated pig with all the extra water I am carrying around--I look nothing like in the pictures above--I'm up about 6 pounds--and while still pretty tired, I'm actually going to go for a short swim today and looking forward to a weekend outdoors.

Life is FUCKING AWESOME!!!

The Truth About Tapering, Part III

First, check out my new bitch! Sorry, Cindy, she's mine! I pre-ordered her a few months ago and completely forgot and then she arrived on Tuesday! Here's another tip for your taper, while you're at home, anyway: arrange to have gifts delivered to yourself! It's really a mental boost to get something brand spanking new during your taper, considering that by this time everything you have for race day should have been tested out already.

Yesterday was another gorgeous day. I awoke after another good 8-hour sleep (I guess my evil plan of cutting out any mid-day training caffeine is working) to a crystal clear blue sky (once the sun came up, that is!). For some reason, on my training plan, I had a hefty swim workout planned for Friday, but that is the day before a swim race, so I had decided I'd do the big workout today (yesterday) because I only had to do a :45 run later in the day.

I have successfully not worn bike shorts on LGL or Bitchie for 2 weeks now, and as it's July, I stopped wearing a shirt over my swimsuit on the way to the pool effective yesterday. I'd rather not wear shorts, either, but CF has a wide saddle, and I need something over the bottom! It was almost 70 when I left for the outdoor pool, and I was glad to not induce extra sweating from wearing a shirt.

I got to the pool by about 6:20, and my posse of cops in training were there. We started chatting right away, and when I finally got in the water (apparently I was in no particular hurry), I demonstrated a bunch of drills to the guys. I'm trying not to bombard them but I did want to show them where this is all going. They are all brutally strong, but they already realize that swimming is about technique more than strength. After all, me, a tiny Yard Gnome, can move through the water pretty well!

Well, the cops were finished, and by the time we went through the drills and all it was 7:00. No worries, I have plenty of time to get in 3300 meters! So I was just about done with my warmup, and Chuck shows up. I stand corrected--he has not done an Ironman--he's done a number of HIM's--but still from what he tells me he trained like a complete fucking maniac when he was doing them. He picks up my baggie with swim workouts in it and inspects what I'm doing. I pointed out that I'd do the big workout today so I'm a little rested for Saturday's swim race (although I could care less how I do--it will just be nice to swim in Crystal Lake, which is beautiful). Chuck got in, I finished my warmup, and now it was time for my main set:

30 x 50 (20"), as odds very Hard, evens very Easy.
3x300 (20") pull at race pace

I haven't done this workout since last year, and for once, I was looking forward to all those 50's! Plus, I had Chuck in my lane, and that was plenty motivating. So I actually blew the carbon out of my arms and was surprised that I had some speed in me, but I tell you, after about 20 of those 50's, even though half of them are easy, your arms are pretty much screaming from the lactic acid buildup. And then I just rested 20" before getting onto the 300's, although I did one 300 and was sick of turning (in a 50-meter pool, go figure), so I swam 600 straight after that. And my pace wasn't bad at all! I was sort of in shock that I was able to swim well, especially since the water was pretty warm.

Chuck and I finished about the same time and then we just hung out in the water talking about who knows what, and we live near one another and so we agreed to meet for our ride home. I'm laughing thinking about us riding home because we rode pretty much two abreast and were just talking and talking and it was beautiful outside (bright sunshine, no clouds) and we both had good swim workouts and it was fun. Chuck peeled off about 1/2 mile from where I live, and he may make it to the pool on Friday, as will the cops, so that will be fun.

One of the things we talked about on the ride back was how there's a lot of riding uphill, because it seems much easier on the way to the pool, but we laughed that part of it is that we've just done a serious workout. But my legs were now letting me know, hey, dumbass, you pretty much did a race yesterday, what the fuck are you doing? Too bad, I just can't justify driving to the pool when it's so nice outside. Although since Chuck and I were riding side by side, I think we both may have been pushing the pace a bit even though we were both on hybrids--ya think???

Back home to work, and I'm feeling a little tired, like I actually worked out or something (go figure!). When it was almost time for me to go run, I could tell my legs weren't going to be too happy about it, but I only needed to go out for :45, so no worries there. I decided to go into the wind, which took me west and north. It is odd for this time of year to have winds out of the NNW, especially when it's in the 80's, but hey, I don't care.

Running this direction took me through a whole bunch of rollers, and I also made sure I ran right out in the open just to make it harder on me even though my legs felt like crap. That run had everything--tired legs, wind, hills, bonkiness and heat. You can't beat that! When I got home, all I could think was fuck, that felt kind of hilly, so I went to this website to check it out (I don't own a Garmin and don't really want one), and what the fucking hell, I guess I was right:





See, even though I live in Illinois, which everyone thinks is pancake flat, the nice little suburb I live in has a good amount of rollers. And I live in a little valley, so pretty much anywhere I go from home is up and then rolling, but this particular run was about one of the rolliest routes I've picked in a long time. But it's all good, since I run on rollers pretty much all the time, that I'm used to it, and I actually don't like completely flat runs (well ask me that in about a week!).

So I laughed at what I had done to myself, and then my legs were pretty much toasted and I wanted to take a nap or at least lay down, but I couldn't. I finished up working for the day, and then I headed to The Bike Shop to get my tubulars checked out, a final derailleur check and just to hang out a bit. On the way, I felt compelled to stop at Binny's to get some booze for the guys at the shop who take such good care of me and my bikes, and also a few liquor-filled candies, which Anthony and I enjoyed. I had Anthony reattach the X-nut on my Hydrotail, which had fallen out on Sunday (I needed a lock nut on the screw), and it was hilarious because he needed my small fingers to get the nut inside while he inserted the screw, and I'm telling him, "Wait, don't stick it in yet!" while I was positioning the nut over the hole. Well, it was funny at the time...

As soon as I got home, I had to mow the lawn, and I must say, I've never seen a better looking lawn in July, but of course, that's from all the rain we had in May and June, and I'm not complaining! My flowers are looking stupendous, life is just fucking awesome!

After mowing, I came inside and chopped ingredients for my dinner salad, popped a beer and stretched for :25, then sat down to eat dinner finally around 7:30. Last night's salad was greens, 2 hard-boiled eggs, a can of albacore tuna, 2 apricots, a handful of blueberries and a tomato, liberally doused in olive oil, balsamic glaze and a freshly squeezed lemon. Yum! I've gone through almost a dozen eggs in the last 5 days.

This morning I'm sensing a little sadness, as I can tell the days are shortening up, but that helps me to sleep a little longer, and I got almost 8 hours again. I'm going to do a flop around in the pool swim, and then I've got another brick workout to do, but I am not going (famous last words!) to go out at sprint pace--I don't think I can today, but we'll see. I'm going to ride Bitchie with the disk on and maybe the aero helmet. Scratch that. If I go out like that, I have to ride hard! We'll see how my legs are--while I ran hilly yesterday, I didn't run very fast.

It looks to be another gorgeous day. Have I said this is my best summer ever? Sometimes when I stop and think about that, I think how could that be when I just lost my parents so recently? But then I think they know how much I am kicking the living shit out of every day, and in the end, we all make our own happiness, right?