It Takes Big Balls

...to register for and put in the hard training to achieve a decent result in an Ironman (or in my case, something even longer).  The time commitment to do the training and everything in support of it is staggering.  Yet, it's one of the stupidest things in the world to do!  Most of us aren't making a living at the fine art of demonstrating just how much we can exercise, and yet we do it.  It makes us feel alive, powerful and focused.

I'm in a full taper right now, and there have been other tapers where I've been full on serious and bothered by everything and anything, and while I am sure I will get there eventually, right now I have an attitude of sheer joy and fun about it.  It's traditional for me to post a picture of a tapir on my blog so here he is:

Notice what big balls he has!  This is what you get when you are either a) an actual tapir or b) tapering for an Ironman.  I couldn't stop laughing this morning in the pool thinking about the tapir, and how ridiculous this passion of mine can be!  But when you do it, you make friends who are just as crazy about this pursuit of extreme fitness and you find they share many other qualities with you besides just being really, REALLY good at exercise.

How is it that it became almost enjoyable to mentally torture myself on the trainer for up to 5:30? Because I CAN.  Because I have big, huge fucking balls.  Because that's what it takes.  Because I knew in signing up for a winter Ironman that that is how it would go.  I've set up my Iron Kingdom (family room outfitted with bike trainers and a treadmill plus kick ass sound and video system) to support this silly passion of mine.  I'm obsessed with it, and I'm OK with that.  Despite all the shit that has gone on in my life this past year, I feel great, if only because I got through the training and that is the hardest part!

It takes big balls to be an Ironman at any age, and I think even more for a woman my age.  What the hell was I thinking to sign up for another one of these?  I was thinking I LIKE HAVING BIG BALLS MAY AS WELL USE THEM!  Perhaps that sounds boastful, but I really don't care.  I love it when someone complains to me about some little thing that hurts or how hard it is to eat healthy and then I give them the laser stare and tell them basically to HTFU.  Most people don't know what hard is.  Hard is not having legs or having your house destroyed by a tornado, like the ones that hit not too far from me yesterday.  Hard is losing your job through no fault of your own and incurring the scorn of people who think that everyone on welfare is a lazy freeloader.  Hard is knocking on death's door due to a disease you had no control over and needing to decide how to live the precious time you have left.

Most of us, fortunately, don't have much uncontrollable HARD in our lives, so some of us self-induce it.  I know that by doing what I've been doing the last 13 years that when something truly hard enters my life, I am a little better able to weather it.  But mostly, I just really like being fit.  And being hyperfit.  And smiling about it, joking about it, and occasionally racing.  And sharing all of that with other like-minded people.

So here's to all of you with big balls.  Show them off proudly!

Why I Don't Mind Winter So Much

It's not that I actually prefer riding on the trainer or running on the treadmill, but when I train this way, it saves me tons of time.  Unless it's a ride over 3 hours (2 more coming up this weekend!), I only need to go into my fridge and grab a bottle of Gatorade and/or Coke to drink.  So I save time because I don't need to:

• Mix up one or more bottles of Infinit or defizz Coke
• Load up a Fuel Belt (I have 3)
• Wash said bottles
• Spend time figuring out what to wear based on the weather
• Obsess about the weather
• Drive somewhere cool and/or safe to ride long
• Remember to put on my Road ID (yes I have one now)
• Pack a cooler so my bottles stay cold if I'm riding in Fermilab
• Transfer my "wallet" (it's a small case from a bike ride LOL), phone and spare keys to gym or bike bag
• Choose a nice looking outfit (I must represent, after all!), although I do do this indoors at times
• Load bike into car, take it out, load it back in, take it out, put it into the house
• Remember to pack a bag for dirty clothes
• Apply sunscreen
• Pack extra food if I'm driving somewhere
• Clean bikes

Swimming is pretty much the same for me year round since I swim indoors, although it actually takes a bit more time in the winter because I have to wear more clothes just to be outside and in my car for the short amount of time it takes to drive to/from the Y.  I know, I could walk, but that would add time with boots and all.

Maybe it doesn't seem like that much time that I'm saving during winter training, but trust me, it adds up quickly.  Now, you might think that is balanced out by the monotony of trainer riding and treadmill running.  Well, there's that.  But I have a good TV and a great sound system and I can have the music LOUD, and all my fluids are COLD. 

I also tend to train less in the winter months, and were it not for winter, I would probably kill myself year round!  Seriously!  Much as I'd enjoy living in a warmer climate, I just don't know how I'd stop myself from wanting to be running, riding and swimming outdoors A LOT all the time!

And since my winter indoor sessions (except for long runs when I'm training for a marathon which I will be after IMCOZ) are typically shorter than in-season, it's an opportunity for me to build/reinforce my personal HTFU, because I hate steady-state stuff on the trainer/treadmill, and typically do progressive rides/runs.  That IM-pace ride on Saturday bored the crap out of me to ride steady for such a long time, for example.  Rides like that are the exception rather than the rule.

The time I save from training indoors gets reallocated to other pursuits that I really enjoy, like cooking, reading, sewing, more strength training and relaxing.  Then there's that lack of yard work in the winter.  And you might say, but SNOW!  Well, yes, there's that, but I don't mind shoveling when it's just 1-2" and fluffy.  To me, it's an opportunity to be outside in it.  I should do more cross-country skiing, too, but oh well, not this winter.

I also like drinking wine in the winter with a good, hearty meal.  I'm just not into wine in the warmer months.

Finally, my house is much, much cleaner in the winter.  There isn't bike and run gear all over the place!

But hey, I'm leaving for Cozumel in 2 weeks and get to temporarily put winter on hold!  I used to regularly take a winter vacation somewhere on a beach before I started doing triathlons.  I'm going to start doing that again, even if it includes some sort of race.  In 2014, I'm going to Vegas in March, and in 2015, it's back to Orlando (can't believe I haven't been to Florida since 2011) for Dopey Challenge.  I am also going to try and get down to Florida this coming spring to impose on some friends that said I could come and visit whenever I want.

So as much as winter can be a pain in the ass at times, I'm going to keep my positive attitude about it being an opportunity for me to switch gears for a few months.

The Final Assault

I sit here with sore legs.  They were sore on Monday from serious biking over the weekend.  They were sore on Tuesday from Monday's biking.  They were sore on Wednesday from Tuesday's biking and running.  They are sore today from yesterday's 16.5 mile hard run.

Why do I do this?  Because I can. Because I delight in seeing just how far I can push this one incredible piece of machinery that is my body.  Because when I push my body and it rewards me with endorphins, I feel good about myself.  Because I love the look on peoples' faces when I tell them my age and they can't believe it.  Because feeling so strong in my body makes me feel so strong in spirit.  Because when I do this to myself it makes so many other life challenges that much easier to handle.  Because when I can quiet my mind during training and let my body go on autopilot, I can quiet my mind in other circumstances where I might otherwise become overwhelmed.  Because I get a kick out of feeling like I'm 25 when I'm really 57.  Because I love setting an example for others of how GREAT you can feel.

I fully realize that this is a frivolous, unnecessary passion.  Nobody needs to exercise as much as I do (and I am careful to point that out to those who question how it is that I look how I do).  Some might even say it is unhealthy. But I would rather die doing this than some of the alternatives.  I would never say my lifestyle is for everyone.  In fact, it's not for very many people at all!  It's all for me.  Because by indulging this passion of mine, it makes me a better person.

I'm in the last 2 weeks of hard training for IMCOZ.  My run taper officially begins Sunday, but there's one more week of heavy biking to seal the deal.  In a way, I crammed for this race.  I only officially began training 20 weeks out from race day.  But I have the accumulated fitness to cram, and despite various other annoyances, I've enjoyed every single minute of it!

One of the things I am particularly enjoying is watching my friend, Brad, go through the same training that I am doing.  That was the deal for me coaching him, as he was stupid enough to ask me if he could use my training plan.  He's 26, and I've always wondered over the years whether I was more tired than I should be at various points in training cycles, so it's fun for me to hear a 26-year old reporting in that this is hard!  I hope he's realized that this isn't hard just to demonstrate just how Crackheaded I am--this is serious, elite-level Ironman training.  I am still amazed that I can train at this level.  Believe it or not, I have dialed back on some things, but I would need to go into too much detail for others to understand.

I know this will sound like a broken record, but I have always attributed my ability to train like this to doing all the right things:

• Daily stretching
• Frequent massage
• Continuous self education about my body, including musculature (to self-diagnose potential injuries), nutrition, exercise modalities, etc.
• An appropriate diet (regular and training nutrition) for my goals (that will always include BEER!)
• Proper training methods (periodization and all that)
• Strength training--I'm still at it and haven't broken my 20+ year streak!
• Sleep: while my need for sleep seems to have diminished, I must be getting enough to keep this up, right?
• Support system.  It goes without saying that it helps to know and hang out with other crazies!
• Keeping it real.  As serious as I can get about all this, I keep it fun.  Ask anyone who rides with me how much we are laughing.
• Staying on top of health issues

This is hard work!  I've also always said that actually doing the training is the easy part.  It's all the other things that enable that to happen. 


Today I do yet another 5K swim, which is really no big deal, as I've swum a lot farther than that.  But the middle 4200 will be where the action is at.  Tomorrow is my race rehearsal ride/run.  I will ride on the trainer since it will only be maybe 30 degrees when I start, but will change clothes quickly and run outside.  I will ride 5:30, which will end up being more than 112 miles, but I want the 5:30 of training stimulus.  Then I will run 6 miles at my Ironman pace.  Then I will have a food extravaganza!

Next week is less running, but 2 long rides on the weekend--5:30 and 4:00.  That will be tough, but oh well!  Like I say to many people, "it's a tough job, but someone's got to do it!"

My legs are sore.  I love this stuff!  I can't think of anything else I'd rather be doing!

I Should Write a Blog Post

I don't really know how many people read my blog, but I'm pretty sure that the ones who do anxiously await my next missive, so here goes.

I've been on the non-generic Synthroid for 5 days, and I am optimistic that it is making a difference for me.  My heart no longer feels jumpy 2 hours after I take the meds, and I just feel more "level."  But as to how I should feel, I still have no clue.  I am less than 4 weeks out from another Ironman, and while I have been able to execute most of the training in my plan, some of it has been at less intensity than I would prefer, and I couldn't tell you whether that's due to:

• Age.  Yep, I got older.  How the fuck did that happen?
• The underlying nature of hypothyroidism, whether or not medicated.
• The meds themselves
• I need to HTFU
• I really did get out of shape for over a year

So when somebody asks me, "How do you feel?"  I am not really sure what to tell them.  Overall, I would say I feel pretty great, considering how much I am training, that I'm 57, and I'm going on my 17th Ironman.  I mean, what the fuck, how many people are in that category?  I've noticed that I can't get my heart rate up much at all beyond maybe 110, and again, I am not sure what the reason is.

So based on the above, I have no fucking expectations going into IMCOZ, because there are too many variables in play at the moment.  That's OK, though--I am pretty sure I can finish the thing and not do too poorly.  I am not sandbagging here, either!  I know some people on the sidelines are thinking WTF she has trained like her usual beastly self, she ought to come out really well, and to you I would say why don't you try stepping into my shoes?  Yes, I have retained this freakish ability to train a lot, and yes, I still enjoy it in a perverse way--the pain, the mental suffering, the stupid things that come up and my ability to get past them.

Just yesterday, for example, I didn't sleep enough, which I blame on the stupid time change.  I had settled into waking up around 3AM, which is still a bit earlier than I would like, but even still, I would get so many things done in the wee hours.  In case you are wondering, that is when I perform my coaching duties, clean my house (because if I wait until later in the day, I will be too tired and just go FUCK IT), wash the dishes, fix bottles for biking, catch up on email, write blog posts and generally organize myself.  Anyway, my legs were also quite sore yesterday.  From biking.  See this last push has me biking 4 days straight, and none of it is what I would call easy.  Plus I shelled myself a bit on Saturday with that 114 miles in 4:30--but I am also quite pleased that I did it!

So what did I do yesterday?  I started out by raking my entire back yard, and I think that took about 1.5 hours.  I tend to rake competitively, so it's like another workout in a way.  I thought that might tire me out enough to make me go down for a short nap, which I attempted, but failed.  I also felt nutritionally depleted, so after I raked, I ate another breakfast--2 eggs fried in butter with 2 slices of buttered toast.  YUM!  Then at about 11AM, I thought I'd eat lunch and have a beer and see if that would get me to nap, but again, I failed.  But after laying in bed for maybe 20 minutes, I did seem to feel better (sometimes a beer "resets" my brain don't ask me why), so I got up and decided to motivate and go work out at the Y, since I needed just to be around other people, since I've been doing a lot of training in my house.  I packed a Coke and a bottle of Cheaterade to fuel me for a 1:30 ride and :40 brick run.

Now, many people would have bagged their workouts given my lack of sleep and sore legs.  And I get that.  And there are times when I would make the call to bag it, too, but yesterday was not one of them, being close to the race, and with this and next week being the real tests of HTFU and final fitness building.  Plus, in the back of my mind is always the thought that there will be periods during the race where I will feel this shitty, so might as well get used to it now!

I got on a Precor stationary bike, and predictably, didn't have much power, but I had enough for the circumstances, and the Coke helped the time pass quickly, but near the end, I began dreading the run.  I just didn't think I'd be able to hack it, but I transitioned quickly (I wore my running shoes on the bike), and went to the indoor track, and figured I'd just start out nice and easy, see how I felt, and if I really felt too tired to keep going, it would be OK to stop.

My first mile was 10:05, which would be too fast for being in the race, but slow for me in training, but hey, I was running when I felt like shit, so I was OK with it.  Without even feeling like I was pushing any harder, my second mile was 9:34, then 9:27, then the last one was 8:47!  The entire time I was running, I kept thinking I will feel like this in the race, so just feel it and be OK with it.  And I would say that during the 3rd mile, I began smiling and that old feeling of how cool is this came back to me and how awesome is it that I am fit enough to do this shit, and I knew I would finish the workout.

Of course, when I was done, I felt absolutely great, took the BEST SHOWER EVER (I was moaning in there, though because I was pretty wasted), then hit the sauna for some stretching, put on compression tights and headed back home to work some more.

After I was done working, I stretched some more, then I headed over to my friend's house down the street, as she'd invited me for dinner, how nice is that?  We had a nice time talking about this and that and laughing, and I would have stayed longer, except for I was really tired.  When I got home, I stripped, got in bed and passed out in like 2 seconds, and woke up right at 2AM because I had to poop, and this is what happens, and it's hard for me to go back to sleep after that.  I tried, though, but I was glad I'd made it all the way to 2 (the former 3) without waking up once.  So I know I will be a bit tired today, too, but I will get through it.

I am having some work done inside my house next week, and in preparation, I have to move things around in my bedroom, which means, you know, cleaning, too, and I'm getting there.  Behind my big dresser, I found this:

It was my Mom's.  Isn't it garish?  But I love it!  I wish I could wear it during IMCOZ!  Wouldn't that just be a fucking hoot? You never know--maybe I will pin it to my race belt.  It's about 2.5" in diameter.  I would be the most sparkly Crackhead ever!

On that note, today I swim 3500 and then run 1:10 later, and while I feel a little worked, I'm pretty sure I can HTFU and get through it just fine.

Have a great day!

Mystery Science Theater 3000 and the 2014 Annual Training Plan (ATP)

First, let me say I love robots.

Second, the whole sodium thing was just me OD'ing on sodium when I didn't need it.  My weight is down to 113, which while I would prefer it to be about 2 lbs. less, is still going to be just fine for racing.  After 2 days on the mild diuretic and then just watching my other sodium intake, order has been restored!  I'm really not a fatty!  Even my massage therapist, Mike, said he could tell the difference between this week and last week.  I don't feel completely bloated anymore, and my skinsuit felt GOOD when I wore it for another 5K swim yesterday.

Third, I decided early this week that I was getting tired and frustrated with the management of my thyroid, and so I called to schedule an appointment with my doctor.  Only she's out for 2 weeks, so I decided (with help from a friend) that it couldn't hurt to speak with a different doctor at the same practice.  Of course, in preparation, I summarized a bunch of data and wrote up all the questions and concerns I had.

I had seen this doctor before, but he didn't remember much about me, so I led off with, "I am pushing the metabolic boundaries of my body."  He looked at me all puzzled, and I explained that I do marathons, Ironmans, the occasional Ultraman and sometimes ultramarathons.  I could tell by the look on his face that he understood what I was saying.  You don't say all those things in one sentence and not be taken for a serious athlete (or complete lunatic).

We reviewed my up and down thyroid tests, I explained that I was frustrated that we'd been at this for nearly a year and I am still not stabilized, and that I still didn't feel "right."  Now, don't get me wrong--in some ways, I feel fucking fantastic--but I can also tell things just aren't right.  I am hypersensitive to my heart performance, body composition, sleep, bowel movements, all that.  This doctor listened to me, and then he grilled me as to whether I was taking the meds properly (YES) and whether I was messing with the dosing on my own (FUCK NO I WOULD NOT MESS WITH THAT, although I did not actually say FUCK NO, although I thought it).

He paused for a moment and then said that we need to get me off the generic.  THE GENERIC???  I didn't know I was ON a generic and that there was NOT A GENERIC.  He said some people just don't do well on the generic, and the fact that I was forced to be cutting pills meant I wasn't getting a precision dose.  So here's what we are going to do: I started on the non-generic today at 75mcg, and we will see at my next test whether we are achieving the desired result.  He also gave me a referral to an endocrinologist, which I will utilize if I don't start to feel "right" in the next 3 weeks or so, i.e., right before IMCOZ.  Now, I recognize it will be hard for me to tell, because as you know, I have so much HTFU and I get so excited about all this shit and I will be tapering so how could I not feel great?  But I think I will know when all my bodily systems are synchronizing properly again.

The best part of my office visit was at the end, when the doctor looked me in the eye and said, "You look AMAZING for someone your age, and the fact that the only meds you are on is Synthroid speaks volumes about you."  He also said that anyone going through my metabolic ups and downs would be driven mad, let alone someone like me training for an Ironman!  You cannot imagine how great that made me feel.  Because I thought I was pretty damn healthy and that I was (despite the extreme endurance exercise) taking pretty good care of myself.  And that this science experiment has been a clusterfuck.

Oh and the other great part of the visit was that my blood pressure, despite the fact that I felt all jacked up when I walked in, was a beautiful 117/72.

So I am optimistic that perhaps we may have cracked the Crackhead thyroid nut, and if not, well then off to the endo I will go. 

Switching gears, I've been working on my ATP and came up with Version 1 earlier this week.  I know from having done this exercise several times that I always come up with something that's psycho initially.  I've learned more about myself including respecting the fact that I'm older and how much I can tolerate.  I've also learned just how incredibly fit I am despite thinking I did almost nothing earlier this year and most of last year.  I may not be fast, but hey, I can go all day and then some!

So I sat on the first psycho version of my 2014 ATP for a couple of days, then revisited it, because you really have to look at the numbers multiple ways in order to know you've got it right.  So I updated workouts and such yesterday, and this morning I checked my work and found out I'd made a few mistakes (this all comes from my actuarial side--it's called "reasonableness checking") and a few other things still weren't quite right.  Now I'm happy with what I've got, and it it still subject to change as I go along in the plan.  I'm tapering more on the front and back end of races, and there is still some wiggle room in there that I am sure I will need to take advantage of here and there.  But it's still a fucking awesome plan, and it's below.

My A race for 2014 is 24 Hours of Triathlon, or as Brad and I call it, 24 Hours of Crack!  Brad is in charge of creating the strategy for us to break the record based on our individual strengths.  Right now, Brad is the ace cyclist.  I might have him on overall swim and run endurance, though, but in terms of pacing, early on Brad will have me beat.  But he knows that the longer the event, the less I slow down compared to other people, so this should be interesting.

Red Rock Canyon marathon should be fun.  I should even have a chance at qualifying for Boston there, but if I don't, I won't cry.  I won't be doing straight-up marathon training for it, and will continue to bike and swim moderately throughout that cycle.  But if I rest appropriately after IMCOZ and can nail all the quality runs in training, I should do well.  I did go 4:20 at Goofy Challenge in 2010, and that was the day after a 1/2 marathon, so a 4:05 is a definite possibility, which is all I need to BQ.

Triple T in May will be a "train through" race, but I need to be in Ironman shape for it.  I love that race, and can't wait to see who else I know that I can con into going and sharing the Crackhouse (cabin) with me.  So far, it's just Lori, but I know there will be others.  It's nice to have a cabin full of people you know and love there!

Leadman 250 will be like my 3rd Ironman distance race of the year.  It's 5K/223K/22K, but one needs to build better than Ironman bike fitness (which I have and love maintaining), a bit better than Ironman swim fitness (which I have but it's currently dormant), and you might think you don't need to do Ironman-level run training, but yes you do!  Unless your Ironman marathon is under 3 hours ;)  So doing Triple T and 24CRACK in the leadup will be perfect preparation, and then just a bit more than my normal amount of bike training for part of the time.  Actually, I should close out 2013 with about 334 hours of biking, and the 2014 ATP plus estimate of the remainder through year end will put me at about the same amount.  So actually, in aggregate, I won't be biking more next year than this year--it will just be concentrated into less time, since I will go really light initially.

Oh yeah, there's that Chicago ITU Oly in there in June, but that's a "just for fun" race.  I will do however I do.

All in all, 2014 looks to be a great year if I can execute it.  So now I can just finish up the last few weeks of heavy training for IMCOZ knowing that I have other great things on the horizon no matter how that race goes.  I am grateful for being able to nurture such incredible fitness despite:

• Being on a thyroid rollercoaster for well over a year, including a scary hyperthyroid incident
• Landing in the ER for we still don't know what
• Overcoming a virus that took me completely down for 3 days and that lingered for 4 weeks
• Crashing while running and being beat up a little from that for about 2 weeks
• Self-diagnosing and overcoming a sodium overdose
• Experiencing on and off issues (and experiments) with my right foot and lower back in general

All in all, I will have only formally trained for IMCOZ for 15 weeks.  All of the above happened in that space of time.  Fuck!  That's a lot of shit for 15 weeks, isn't it?  But all of us go through bunches of shit--I am so grateful for the family and friends that stick by me through all of this.  Really, most days I have to pinch myself for all the goodness that is in my life, including right now.

Enjoy the Crackitude below!

Another Challenge Met and Nearly Conquered and Crackhead Nutrition 101

So, I've been puzzled by some weight gain since August--about 4 lbs.  There is no way I could be gaining weight at the level I'm training at, while being hungry most of the time and nearly bonking during many workouts.  I asked the nurse at my doctor's office last week, and she said maybe it's muscle.  Um...NO.  I told her we need to figure this out or else I am going on a crash diet, and she shouldn't want me to do that because I will starve myself and disappear!

Still, I figured this was an opportunity to clean up my diet a little bit, so last week I started watching what I was eating--eliminating any candy, less beer, less pasta.  Weight was not budging, and it should have at least .5 lb.

On Saturday morning, I put on a pair of bike shorts that just a few weeks ago fit fine and they were TIGHT!  I was like WTF is this?  So I got on the scale, and THREE MORE POUNDS ARE THERE!!!  Clearly this is not regular weight gain, and on Friday I'd realized that I'd been drinking my sodium-laden (although not excessive for intense exercise on a hot day) Infinit a lot more than I ever have at this time of the year, and I typically get all salt cravy (cravy is a new word I just invented--you're welcome), so I thought I might be OD'ing slightly on sodium, but still...

I ordered a reduced sodium custom Infinit mix on Friday, but it hasn't arrived.  It has 32% less sodium than my "hot weather" mixture.  I am going to make one more custom formula with even less in it that I can use during winter months.

I talked with my nurse friend, Lori, about this while I was on the bike Saturday, and she suggested I just drink clear water during my ride.  But I was riding 5 hours, no way I could survive that without calories--I know my body pretty well.  So I looked at what I could switch to, and I ended up eating a Clif bar and one gel.  For the 5 hour ride I took in only 600 calories, but I had 750 in before I started so I was OK and didn't bonk, and I even did hard intervals.  But, I have so much HTFU, don't I?

I tried to eat well right after the ride, and then I had sushi for dinner with my brother Mike, and fuck, I really wanted the soy sauce, but I only let myself have a tiny bit.

Yesterday morning, I weighed myself, and those 3 additional lbs. were still there, and I rode Death Machine for 3.25 hours on 366 calories of Infinit, so I had some sodium going there AND CAFFEINE!  For lunch, I had some mostly plain pasta with barely any homemade salmon sauce, which still probably contained a good hit of sodium, but not too terribly much.

I baked some banana wheat germ muffins to begin eating for breakfast, as it turns out my beloved English muffin has too much sodium for my own good.  I even left out the pinch or so of salt in my muffin recipe because as it turns out FUCKING NO SUGAR ADDED ALMOND MILK HAS A BUNCH OF SODIUM IN IT!   Not enough to be lethal to me, but enough that it warranted not adding additional salt to my recipe.  You see what's going on here--you try and eat/drink something you THINK is healthy, but it really isn't.  Ugh...  I started using almond milk in my muffins 2 years ago as a way to reduce the fat in them, but guess what?  EXCESS SODIUM!  Fuckers...

For dinner, I had a salad with no added sodium and some sirloin steak with no salt, and then I had a Fage yogurt, which FUCKING YAY, barely has any sodium in it.  Not sure if I got enough calories, but today I only have to swim so I should be OK.

I was feeling puffy still, though, so I talked to my friend's wife, Nancy, since I know she is all over various sorts of things with her body and figured she might have some advice for me.  She did, and suggested some natural diuretic pills, which I immediately went out and bought and took one with dinner.  THANK YOU NANCY!!!

I don't know if it was the pill by itself, or the pill plus my reduced sodium yesterday, but I weighed myself and 3 lbs. is gone.  FUCK YEAH!  Now I need to see 4 more go.  It will be interesting to see what my "real" weight is--I'm guessing maybe 111--but we shall see.

So I'm now watching my sodium intake like a hawk--I still want some during training, and cut my Infinit by half so I still get some plus some calories, and Coke is OK since it isn't sodium laden (THANK GOD OTHERWISE I WOULD KILL MYSELF), and I can even do Gatorade.  I just need to keep my non-training sodium intake to a minimum.

At the moment, I don't know if this sodium episode is a direct result of the hypothyroidism, or whether it's just that since this is the first time I've trained for a winter Ironman and used so much Infinit during training that I just kinda OD'ed on sodium.  Whatever.  I will report this to my doctor today (including that I'll be taking a mild diuretic for a few days), and see how I do with less sodium during training the next few weeks.  I have a feeling I will be OK using the full-strength Infinit on race day in Cozumel since it will be hot.  I don't care if I"m puffy for a few days after that race--I just need to be sure my body can handle it, so this will require a decent discussion with my doctor.

I thought I'd reprise some of my general nutrition wisdom in this post as well. I try as best as I can to follow the guidelines for carb intake based on training hours from an older version of one of Monique Ryan's sports nutrition books.  Here's the table for low to high training hours:

And here's the table for excessive amounts of training, i.e., a Crackhead:

In order to achieve this easily (i.e., without keeping track of precise calorie intake daily) at different levels of training throughout a season, I've made some rules for myself:

• If I'm training < 12 hours per week, no rice or pasta at dinner.  Just salads loaded with veggies.
• If I'm training 12+ to 14 hours per week, I can have rice at dinner.  Gives me a boost in carbs.
• If I'm training 14-16 hours per week, I can have pasta 1 or 2 times per week at dinner in addition to rice the other days.
• If I'm training 16+ hours per week, I can have pasta as often as I like.
• If I'm training 18+ hours per week (as I have almost every week for the last 17 weeks), then I can even have things like candy, Cheetos and Twinkies.  Again, not excessive amounts, but just as "treat" foods, because at this point, it actually becomes difficult to EAT ENOUGH calories, especially on days when I train > 4 hours.

Now, you must realize that as training hours increase, the amount of carbs you are taking in DURING TRAINING SESSIONS naturally goes up, and you have to consider your total carb intake including all regular food PLUS all the training nutrition.  This is really important, and why some people (I even did this once) PUT ON WEIGHT while training for an Ironman--they think they can eat with abandon, and you really CAN NOT.  Especially a small person like me.  

Now some other things I do include:

• I drink Endurox R4 as a recovery drink on days where I train 1.5 hours or more, which is pretty much every day until I rest a few weeks after IMCOZ.  But I only use 1.25-1.5 scoops, as I am small, and the serving size of 2 scoops is calibrated for a larger person.  I have used Endurox for years.  It's expensive, but I feel better for using it, plus it has a good dose of vitamins in it.
• I use Ultrafuel before training sessions of 4+ hours.  If I'm doing 4 hours, I will use 3 scoops (300 calories), and if I'm doing 5+ hours I will use 4 scoops (400 calories).  This stuff also has some vitamins and minerals in it.  It's basically sugar with some flavor and vitamins, and is relatively inexpensive.  It was recommended to me by my very first triathlon coach, and I swear by it for preloading on heavy training/racing days.  I know so many people who begin an Ironman with maybe 300 calories in their bodies and that is just FUCKING STUPID, and they wonder why their performance suffered.  When you do this, you basically dug yourself a hole that you cannot get out of that entire day!  You burn through 300 calories maybe halfway through your swim meaning you are starting the bike depleted already.  So before a 1/2 or full IM, I will have about 800 calories in the tank before I start--400 calories of Ultrafuel, plus about 400 calories of actual breakfast plus sips of Gatorade.
• I have had my BMR measured so that I know that I am dialing in my calorie intake appropriately.  I want to get it done again, but not until we have my thryoid meds dialed in.  No sense doing it until that happens, because I will get a false reading.  The last time I was measured, my BMR was 1950, meaning when I do nothing for a day I need that many calories, and then I expend on average 500 calories/hour doing any form of exercise, so you can see that when I'm training 2-2.5 hours on weekdays, I need to take in over 3,000 calories!  If you don't know your BMR, though, your nutrition can be a crap shoot, which is why I suggest you go with the tables above FIRST, and then see how you do.  If you get it right, it becomes stupid easy to lose weight--you just drop say 200 calories per day, and in 2.5 weeks you should lose 1 pound.
• I always fuel during workouts, even if they are 30 minutes, just so my brain is happy.  The biggest user of sugar in our bodies is our brain, and it's the reason we bonk, too.  Unless you are training like 5 hours a day or something like that, you have plenty of fat reserves to power you for a long time, but your body won't switch over to full fat metabolism any time soon.  Your brain will shut down your muscles, though, in an effort to save itself when it thinks you are low on sugar.  Now, I would not recommend this to someone training only 10 hours per week.  In that case, none of your sessions are very long, and so you can go plain water much of the time.  But I would say that 12+ hours per week, you might want to always be taking in some sugar, but don't forget this counts towards your daily carb total.
• If I'm swimming 1.5 hours or more, I will switch from Gatorade to Infinit, because the longer the session, the more your body needs the calories especially if you are going to do another workout the same day.  I learned this while training for Ultraman, when I was swimming 2+ hours on most Fridays.  I also had to eat another breakfast right when I was done with those swims, because even though 2 hours of swimming doesn't burn the same calories as 2 hours of running, the fatigue on your body is nearly the same, and so you EAT.
• The calories per hour I shoot for while biking are about 35% of what I'm burning, which I can know from using a power meter.  All other ways of measuring are WRONG--so unless you ride with a power meter, you probably have no clue how many calories you are burning because CALORIES = WORK and the only way to calculate WORK is by POWER EXPENDED.  Some people can go higher than 35%, but in an Ironman I would never go higher than that, as it can be a recipe for GI distress.  Remember that the faster you go, the less calories your body can process, so slower people can generally take in a higher % of calories burned than the faster folks, and liquids are always better than solids because your body can process them easier.
• The calories per hour I shoot for while running are maybe only 25% of what I'm burning, because jostling makes it tougher for your system to digest, and during a triathlon, if you've nailed your bike nutrition, that's sufficient calories to get you through the run.  You never see pros eating fucking sandwiches on the marathon, do you?  You also don't see them chewing bars and shit--too hard to digest.  Plus they are going so fast that it's hard to digest much of anything.  So again, all liquid, unless you really want something else, and don't forget to give yourself SOME sodium on the run if your race is warm, since you WILL need it.  This is why they serve chicken broth at Ironman races.  Because some of us idiots will revert to all Coke, which doesn't have enough sodium to support the electrolytes we are sweating out.

I have guidelines for the day before and morning of a race as well--if you want that, I have a .PDF of a nutrition presentation I've given several times to athletes with all that in it, just message me on Facebook and I'll send it along.

If you are training for Ironman or I would even say half Ironman, and you think you can just wing it on your nutrition, I would tell you that you are DEAD WRONG.   This training places heavy demands on your body, and to treat it any less than the beautiful, complex, awesome machine that it is is to fuck with your karma!  Do you put crap into your car?  Do you feed your pets crap? Just as I believe that daily stretching and frequent massage fall into the category of "cost of doing business," so does good nutrition.

Even me, who thinks I'm doing everything right, can always improve my nutrition.  And so I am.  I'm going to be extra careful about sodium now, and that means the Cheetos and Pringles are off the table.  I can look forward to that McDonald's Sausage McMuffin with Egg after IMCOZ!

57th Birthday Celebration and Ongoing Science Experiment

You know I've been waiting to be able to use a picture of that, right?  Well not exactly waiting, but knowing I would use it one day.

Shelley arrived at my house Saturday morning when I was about 3.5 hours into a 5:30 trainer ride.  Yes, TRAINER.  It was dark and really cold when I started, and I wanted to be around for when Shelley arrived, so trainer it was.  My legs didn't feel exactly peppy, most likely due to all the running I did the week before.  But I didn't feel rotten, either.  About 2 hours in, predictably, I wanted to quit.  I started thinking about how long I was going to be on there, that I would have company, and there were a bunch of other things I'd rather be doing.  But that thought passed quickly, and I pressed on.  I watched Dr. No and From Russia with Love before Shelley arrived.

When she got here, we had huge hugs to start.  We hadn't seen one another since 2009 at IMLP, and had become disconnected later that year.  So it was great to see one another, and as much as I just wanted to continue talking and hugging, I had business to do, so I took her bike into my house, and we unloaded stuff from her car.

Shelley claimed to not be as much of a James Bond fan as I am, but she'd seen Skyfall, and so I recommended we watch Casino Royale, as it's the first one with Daniel Craig, so we put that on.  This must have been the 5th or 6th time I've watched it, and it's good every time.  Non-stop action, beautiful cinematography (as most of the Bond movies have), lush scenery, and in this case, decent character development.  Having this on made me HTFU and work harder on the bike, although Shelley had to leave to go see her son, Ian, who was in town to go to a Blackhawks game.  Shelley is Canadian but now resides in Indianapolis with her husband, Steve, and Ian still lives in Canada, but is a huge Hawks fan.

I was fine putting Casino Royale on hold until later, and I switched to music for my last hour of riding.  I ended up at 122 miles in 5:30.  Now, lest you think I had no resistance on the trainer, I did, and I checked the power curve for it:

Power (watts) = slope x speed (km/h) + intercept

Level	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Slope	3.73	5.33	6.87	8.27	10.07	11.4	13.13	14.4	15.93	17.73
Intercept	-28.67	-36.67	-43.33	-47.33	-66.33	-67.00	-83.67	-82.00	-89.67	-114.67

I was at resistance level 4, so according to this I averaged over 200 watts.  Well, um, no, but still I was kicking out watts, and my legs were appropriately wasted when I finished.

I thought I might run some errands when I was done, but I was too tired to do much more than eat lunch and lay down in bed for an hour or so.  I stretched, and then got ready for dinner, Shelley arrived back from her foray into downtown Chicago, and we went to meet Lori for sushi.

We went to Kyoto in Downers Grove.  I'd been there once before and knew it was good.  Lori and Shelley had wine and I had a giant Sapporo.  We had nigiri and some really great rolls, and I saw someone get this:

so we had to have it.  It was awesome, and the light in the glass changed color, so we had a little show!  I ordered way too many rolls for us to finish, so after dessert of mochi balls, we all made our to go boxes.  Even after all that, the bill wasn't too outrageous, as I'd had a $25 gift certificate that we were able to use.  Shelley and I said goodbye to Lori and went back to my house.

Shelley and I watched the rest of Casino Royale wearing our jammies. Here I am working on my birthday puzzle.  I bought it for myself because I like unicorns ;)

Shelley named my downstairs room the "Iron Kingdom."  I like that name!  It is all about bikes, running and beer down there.  Not sure beer goes with Iron Kingdom, but what the hell, right?

I think once my head hit the pillow that I fell asleep in 2 seconds.  But since I'd stayed up past my bedtime (I've been falling asleep around 7:30 exhausted), I hoped to sleep in a little, but that just doesn't happen lately, and I woke up at my customary 3AM and only got 6 hours of sleep.  I tried to be quiet, and I was until I started bouncing this light up ball on my living room floor, and I guess Shelley heard it as she later reported to me accompanied by a big FUCK OFF.  Oh well.

By the time Shelley got out of bed, I'd already eaten breakfast and drank Ultrafuel and was rarin' to go on my 3:30 ride/:40 run.  She was not.  However, I'd made her coffee and we had some time to chat before I got started, and she got to see how pretty my bar is in the dark

We got ready to get on the trainers again.  I didn't feel too bad considering the day before, and Shelley saw that I had Full Metal Jacked, so we watched that. It made me HTFU and work hard on the bike.  Here I am being a complete dork with my aero helmet on:

Shelley's hip was bothering her, so she got off the trainer after about an hour, and she wanted to go see Ian again anyway, so she got ready and left while I kept going with music on.

This time I did 88 miles in 3:30, so I was able to work harder than on Saturday, which is good, since I was riding for less time.  I did all my interval shit, and I was pretty happy with my effort.  It was nice outside for running, so I stripped off my bike clothes and suited up for outside.

Oh my did I feel tired and also bonky!  I figured there was no way I'd replaced all the calories I'd burned the day before, so I was already way behind starting the run, and even having fueled properly on the bike, I would need to seriously HTFU to get the run done.  It was nice and sunny out, though, so I couldn't help but smile as I was having such a wonderful weekend, and despite feeling bonky, I felt just GREAT!

I was pretty proud of myself when I finished, and so was #OutsideFish:

Of course, after this I had the BEST SHOWER EVER, then I inhaled some food and cracked a beer and stretched, and as much as I wanted to lay down, I needed to get cracking on dinner, since I was cooking for Shelley and Lori.  First I washed dishes (well mostly fucking bottles), then I got the asparagus dish ready to go, got the chicken ready to roast, and waited for Shelley to arrive back.

When she got back, I had one thing on my mind: CHAMPAGNE!  We were going to have it with dinner, but we didn't want to crack open the bottle until Lori arrived.  Within about a minute of her arriving at my house, with all the food almost ready to eat, we had a nice toast and then we were eating, talking, and eating and talking!  We had such a great time, culminating with what I thought was one of the best desserts I've ever had: my homemade Elvis Presley pound cake with one scoop of Hazelnut gelato and another of Coconut gelato.  Lori laughed at how I practically put my face into the bowl, but I was so hungry and it was so tasty!  After I finished mine, I apologized that I needed to eat more, so I had more gelato.

I made Lori take some leftover pasta sauce home with her, and then Shelley and I changed into our jammies and watched Quantum of Solace.  It's not as good as Casino Royale, and also not as long.  I passed out several times, but I'd warned Shelley that I would.  I got up for the end, and then we went to sleep, and I promised Shelley that I wouldn't wake her up in the morning.  Since I was effectively up past my bedtime again, I ended up only getting 6 hours of sleep, but I think Shelley got at least 8.

Monday morning, Shelley and I went to my Y for an easy swim.  We were laughing our asses off a lot, with the highlight being I'm swimming and she is swimming underneath me and I'm like WTF, and she surfaces and says she is Underwater Fish.  That made me keep laughing until I was finished.  I had Shelley check my stroke, and it turns out that I am still crossing over with my left arm if I am breathing on my right, but if I breathe on my left, I'm perfect.  So I will breathe on my left even more than I was until my stupid brain/body gets it!

When we finished, we showered and were about to hit the sauna, when this woman who I gave some swim lessons to and rewarded me with a Bible (yes, ME) began talking to me about how she'd gone vegan and quit eating added sugar and how much better she felt.  I was happy for her, until she started telling me how evil sugar is and that I should stop eating it.  I tried to be nice and explain that being an athlete and all that I NEED sugar while training, but of course, she wouldn't understand.  Still, she went on a bit longer than I thought I could tolerate, and I'm pretty sure Shelley was standing there thinking, "I wonder when Sheila is going to blow her stack at this person?"  Well I didn't even though I wanted to, and I wondered yet again why people have this thing about trying to "fix" me.  Thank you, I'm really not that broken.  However, not too long after that, I made up a prayer that goes like this: FUCK OFF.  AMEN.  If that woman gets on my case again, I will share it with her.

I was hungry WHILE we were swimming, and we decided we'd go to McDonald's for breakfast (my second; Shelley's first).  I had a Steak McMuffin, which was pretty good, but in retrospect, I should have skipped the hash browns.  Those things are disgustingly greasy, but they do taste good.  We both later wished we hadn't gone there at all, but oh well, it was tasty!

We had a few hours to kill, and they'd put up this speed check thing practically right outside my house, and I'd been dying to take a silly picture in front of it.  I decided I'd make a 140.6 sign to put over the flashing speed limit, and so we did it:

The 140.6 is still on there as I write this!  Nobody took it off the sign, and even my neighbors who know I do Ironman probably wouldn't know what it means and suspect me in the shenanigans!

FYI, our splits for the 1-hour Ironman were:

• Swim 5 minutes.  But I think Shelley came in at :04.15.  So that's 7 seconds/100 yds.  Not bad!
• Bike 30 minutes, for 225mph.  Also not bad.
• Run 25 minutes, for a pace of 57 seconds/mile.

After this, I went with Shelley to an ortho appointment about her hip labrum tear.  The surgeon didn't sugar coat anything, and I will not go into details, as that's Shelley's business.

After all that, Shelley had to leave to return home, and I was sad to see her go.  It was like old times, and we'd laughed and caught up and shared our good and bad.  It was a perfect weekend!

Since then, I've been in touch with my doctor again about what's going on with me.  I think the extra 3-4 lbs. on me is possibly water retention, which can be a side effect of either hypothyroidism, levothyroxine, or both.  At any rate, there is no way I could have put on this weight with all the training I've been doing in the last 8 weeks.  So I had a discussion, and the nurse tells me maybe I put on muscle.  WHAT?  Yeah right, EVERYONE puts on muscle in the last 12 weeks of Ironman training.  I asked her if they'd run a bodyfat measurement on me to check and she was puzzled.  At any rate, we decided (with consultation of my doctor) to up my levothyroxine a little more, as it seems that *I* am the one who keeps the best track of monitoring how much and when and what the result was.  And then I can't get my next blood test done until after IMCOZ, and that should be entertaining.  At least I will get to see what that does to my body, eh?  I think the treatment objective for me is to get me as close to hyperthyroid as possible without going over the edge, like I appeared to do in early August.

What was funny is that the nurse said my weight was "stable," and I politely corrected her and said I kept track of it at the same time of the day, and that what they saw in the office every few months was not representative.  I think they are getting the idea that I keep a pretty good eye on myself, you think?

So I will suffer with yet another slight bump in meds and see how it works.  I will know in about a week, even though the nurse claims it takes much longer.  I tried to explain to her that I am trying to separate how I feel due to the training from the effect of the meds, and that it's hard for me to know which end is up.  But if we continue to test me every 6 weeks, I think we will get some idea of how my body behaves on its own, which is what I want to know, because I have a feeling I will need to moderate my levothyroxine dose on my own to match my training objectives.  OH JOY!  But it's just another "thing" to add to my to do list.

On that note, have a great day, I am feeling wonderful!

Crashing and Crackhead Physiology 101

That's me smiling at you!  This picture was on the CD I requested from the CT scan I had done the day I was in the ER.  The reason my teeth are all lit up is that the front 8 (top 4 and bottom 4 central) all have posts/crowns from a rollerskating crash when I was 26, and many of my other teeth have regular crowns on them.  So lots of gold and other metals in there.

I still remember that crash--I was on the Chicago lakefront path at Diversey, and I was wearing red short shorts and a red/white striped tube top (yes I was quite the fashion victim back then), and I was heading north and just missed jumping this 2.5" sidewalk rise.  Both skates crashed into the tiny wall, and I did a face plant onto the concrete, blacked out, and woke up in an ambulance.  Luckily, that day there was a lawyer and paramedic hanging out on the lakefront, and they called the ambulance for me.  I was shaken, but didn't feel too bad other than knowing I'd scraped up my arms and legs.

I passed out again on the way to the hospital (I guess I did go into shock), and when we got there they put me in a room and at that point I was OK to sit up.  Of course someone had removed my rollerskates from my feet and put my tube top back into place.  I guess it had kind of come off my boobs when I crashed.

A doctor came into the room and began examining me and cleaning me up.  I don't remember being X-rayed, as he checked my arms and legs and everything was moving just fine, but then he gave me Betadine and some cotton balls and told me to go work on my face myself since it was going to hurt.  While I was in some pain and knew I'd hit my face, I had no clue what it looked like.

Well I went into the bathroom and saw myself in the mirror and almost fainted!  I became nauseous and had to sit on the floor a few moments, then I got back up and worked on myself.  There was a cut from my lip to my nose (that did not require stitches), and the left side of my face was a giant road rash, including bits of rock and such.  My upper lip was pretty swollen, too.  I kept yelling OUCH while carefully removing bits of debris from my face.  That's when I got a good look at the rest of me, too.  I'd scraped my left shoulder pretty bad, about 8" of my left shin and somehow both elbows.  I looked like I'd been in a car accident!

So after I cleaned up, I went back into the room, they pronounced me ugly but OK to go home, and I was only maybe 1/2 mile from my apartment, so I decided to walk home in the hospital slippers, with my skates slung over my non-scraped right shoulder.  I got a lot of funny looks because of my outfit, the skates, the slippers, and then of course, my face.  My younger sister, Lisa, was staying with me that weekend, and I'd called her from the hospital to get my insurance card info, and she freaked out, but I told her I was OK.

When I got back to my apartment and Lisa opened the door, she started crying when she saw me.  While I was in a little pain, it wasn't that bad, but it was funny to me that she started crying.  I told her I was fine, and then I began to wonder how I was going to wear regular clothes to work with all the scrapes.  I knew nylons (popular back then) were out of the question, and I didn't think I could wear a bra (not that I needed one) over my left shoulder.

The next day I did get on the bus (#151 Sheridan) to go to work.  I found out what it feels like to be looked at when you are disfigured.  My face was a huge mess, now turning into a giant scab on the left side, and of course the swollen lip and cut to my nose.  Some people looked at me in horror, some scowled like I didn't belong on the bus.  I do remember the bus driver joking with me saying, "I bet the other guy looks a lot worse!"  I did have a good laugh about it.

When I got to work, my then boss nearly lost it when she saw me.  She asked why I'd come into work, and I said I felt fine, I just looked bad.  That was when I decided that sometimes it's OK to call into work UGLY!  Nobody in the office could believe I was brave enough to go out in public looking the way I did.  But what was I supposed to do?   Sit at home and be ugly?  I couldn't do that.

Anyway, I just had fun remembering all this.  My face healed up just fine and I don't have any scars from it, but my front 8 teeth had to have root canals and crowns, although I didn't know this for a few years.  At any rate, somehow I didn't break any bones during that crash, but it was pretty spectacular, all things considered!

Now back to my physiology.  I got the test results back from wearing the heart monitor harness. It revealed that what I thought were palpitations were nothing, so there were no adverse findings.  But it recorded my heart rate all the time I was wearing it.  Turns out my resting heart rate is 44!   If I recall, that's about what it was back in 2001 after I had arthroscopy on my left knee.  Turns out 44 is off the charts good for a woman of my advanced age. Actually I am off the chart for an 18 year old girl!  Some of that is my genetic bradycardia, but of course, a resting heart rate that low is also indicative of my fitness, and I would say that I am NOT overtrained based on this.  Maybe I am nearly dead, though!

There are other interesting aspects of my physiology.  My VO2Max is 58, which is sky-high for a woman my age according to this chart. Again, my VO2Max is off the chart for an 18-year old girl.  This is why I am such an endurance freak.

My most recent cholesterol numbers are HDL 80, triglycerides 47 and LDL 122.  So pretty damn good.

The EKG I had in the ER didn't show anything untoward, and apparently there are no robots or monkeys in my brain.  So all I'm left to contend with at this time is the (barely) osteoporosis and hypothyroidism.

The hypothyroidism is my bane, and right now we don't know what my body is doing or why.  My doctor thinks we caught my thryoid when it's just crapping out, but I'm not convinced.  I think I am just extremely sensitive to stress (including training stress) and that it fluctuates.  So I will continue on with my plan of running the thyroid panel every 6 weeks to see what it does at various points in my training cycle.  Even though I tested hypothyroid, the worst I've been measured at, I don't really feel all that bad.  But I did notice I put on a few pounds, and that just shouldn't be happening with all the training I am doing.  But, we are once again increasing my levothyroxine, probably to the point where I am nearly hyperthyroid and that should strip these excess pounds right off me without any effort.  That is how sensitive my physiology is!

The nice thing, though, is that I found an article that explains that I did not MAKE my thyroid do what it's doing.  Remember that I have actually been hypothyroid far longer than I have been doing endurance sports.  At least that's what the tests say.  It could be that when I was tested 15 years ago while depressed that the depression caused the reading.  Or vice versa.  We just don't know.  But there is precedence.

So overall, I would appear to be in good health and there are just some puzzling aspects to my physiology that bear further investigation.  My brother Mike said his doctor is asking him about his siblings, so I can report all my data to him, because a lot of the above is genetic.  However, I am the only child of my siblings who has put my physiology to the test with the lifestyle I lead.  I am happy that I am able to see hard data about myself.  I intend to have at least CBC and metabolic panel run every 6 months now, and next year I will have another bone scan to see if my bones are maintaining (I have a feeling they are even though I've stopped meds for the time being).  I hope my doctor is finding it fascinating to work with someone like me.  I think next time I see her in the office, I am going to tell her how Ironman/Ultraman training really works.  While she knows what an Ironman is, I doubt she (or most people, for that matter) really knows how much training is involved.  I love the fact that she has never once told me to stop doing it, and so far, there is nothing telling me that I need to.  Heart is fine, BP is fine, blood is fine, cholesterol is fine, weight is fine, bones could be better, but even that is genetic (my maternal Grandma had osteoporosis and I think to an extent so did Mom although they never measured it since she never broke a hip), mind is fine for the time being.

Oh yeah the other day some asshole at my pool told me I have no life!  Really.  REALLY?  I told him he had no fucking right (and yes I said FUCKING) to make that statement.  He thinks because all he knows about is that I train a lot that that's all I do.  Well obviously, this blog is mainly about THAT, so to a reader, what else would you think?  But I don't judge others' lifestyles--I figure if a person is happy, that's all that matters, right?  Even if their hobby is collecting potato chips that look like people.  Every single day I feel like I am living the SHIT out of life between my job, my training and racing, my friends and family, gardening, cooking, sewing, reading and whatever else I find time for.  I guess if that's not having a life, then I should probably off myself right now!

Despite the continuing science experiment that is me, I am really super happy, even as I am training like a beast right now.  I can't always do the intensity I want to, and I think that is what is most affected by my thyroid, but I can sure put in the volume, and this week will hit close to 21 hours, which is pretty hefty.  I continue to overcome whatever my thyroid is doing, and for that I am extremely grateful.  I still fucking love fucking training hard, it still feels really awesome to me even when my legs are sore and I'm fatigued most of the time, and it makes me mentally sharp.  So until further notice:

The "Device" and Fashion Update

Yesterday I went back to the hospital to get what they term a "holter" (I once dated a Steven Holter is that the same?), which is like a continuous EKG thing.  You wear the electrodes and the little pack that collects the data for whatever period of time your doctor wants.  Last week, my doctor asked me if I wanted to do this because I'd periodically experienced what feel like palpitations.  Since I have now given myself over to all the science experiments on me, and this is just a mechanical test, NOT drug-induced, I said sure, why not?

I did not know what the thing looked lie or how big it was.  I guess I was thinking standard heart rate monitor stuff, so a strap around my ribcage.  I wasn't looking forward to that, since when I fell last week, I strained and/or bruised my left pec major (also the external oblique, but that's just fine now and I'm left with pec strain but it's coming along nicely), and my ribcage is a bit bony as it is, and I dislike heart rate monitor straps.

I went into the room with 2 techs--primary and a guy who is learning.  I figured I'd have to strip off my shirt so they could put the thing on, so I told them I had no self-consciousness about nudity, but the woman just began attaching electrodes to me, and then she showed me the measuring device, which is smaller than many phones, and all the electrodes hook into it.  She asked if I wanted a belt for it, and I said yeah, I will be biking and running with it on.  No hospital nudity was required--she just lifted up my shirt and felt me up a little!

I had a nice chat with the techs about my bizarre physiology (a bit manic yet hypothyroid; bradycardic yet a Crackhead), and I think they enjoyed hearing about someone other than a couch potato.  I also told them how I could feel my left pulmonary artery pulsing where I'd injured my pec, so the pec inflammation must be irritating it.  I tell you, I know more about the human body than many medical people!  But it's my business to know about my body in order to do what I'm doing and attempting to stay healthy.

So the deal is to write down when I feel weirdness in my heart and at what time.  I am keeping a small spreadsheet of the main things I did yesterday and this morning, just so when the graph of the EKG comes back I can see what my heart does when I am doing certain things.  I am particularly interested in what happens about 1.5 hours after I take the levothyroxine, because I can usually feel my heart start to get all excited.  I am sure they will tell me this doesn't really happen, but LET'S GO TO THE EKG DATA, WOLF (I'm thinking of Wolf Blitzer here LOL).

Anyway, here I am all electroded up:

There are 5 electrodes on me, and you can see the battery-powered measuring device on my left hip.  It doesn't weigh very much (maybe 4 oz.), and since once upon a time in a land far, far away, I used to wear a Walkman on a belt when running, it didn't really bother me. In fact, I had to remind myself to write stuff down for a few hours there.  To date, I experienced what felt like palpitations to me twice, but I'm expecting them in another hour, as I took the levothyroxine about 40 minutes ago.  2 weeks ago when I felt them, it was more central under my sternum, but now they are by my left pulmonary artery.  I suppose it's possible that because I fell on that pec that I have just inflamed that area.  Whatever, we will see what we see.

I had to do a 2-hour ride yesterday, and it was raining and crappy, and I needed to monitor something at work anyway, so it was hop on the trainer.  My training schedule calls for 11.5 hours of biking this week, and I'm pretty sure it will ALL be on the trainer.  That will be a first to do that much all on the trainer!  But I couldn't give a fuck, it has to be done, I have plenty of HTFU and tunes and movies and Infinit!

Here I am ready to start my ride.  I busted out a vintage Zoot outfit that I hadn't worn in a few years.  I think I look really fat, but the shorts seem to fit just fine.  I got that cool silver skull at Walgreen's yesterday on the way home from the hospital!  I check Walgreen's every October, because I usually find some sort of cool Halloween thing, and I was happy to find this because it reminds me of Terminator:

I really didn't notice the monitor while I was on the bike since I had all the electrode cords channeled so I wouldn't get all tangled up on the bike!  I think it was a good idea I was riding on the trainer, because if I'd gone outside with the device, I might have got it wrapped around the bars and crashed!

I had a great ride of 2 hours.  I lengthened it from 1:30 so that I can ride 1/2 hour less on Sunday, when I'm cooking dinner for 2 girlfriends, Lori and Shelley.  I ran :25 on my treadmill, Hal, at a super easy pace.  Turns out I wasn't supposed to run off the bike, oh well, I guess my coach will punish me for that!  I couldn't take a full shower afterwards, so I got in the tub and hung the device on the shower door handle, washed from the waist down, then did my arms and neck.  At 5:30 I went to get a haircut and asked my girl Clorinda to shave my head.  It's really short again, because with all this riding, I can't stand extra hair, although I let her leave slight bangs.  My final haircut before IMCOZ I will get totally shaved down, cuz that's how I roll.  It was nice to finally get my hair washed after walking around being a disgusting pig after working out.

On Saturday I'm riding 5:30, and me and my girls are going out for sushi (I will try not to pass out on them), and then on Sunday I'm riding 3:30 and running :40 off the bike, will lay down for a bit after that and pass out or not, and then I will complete the prep for our Sunday dinner.  Below are the Elvis Presley pound cakes that I baked on Sunday, and following that is the full dinner menu:

• Cheese and crackers while I'm cooking
• Asparagus bundles with fontina and prosciutto.  These are easy to fix, and will take me no more than 1/2 hour to cook the asparagus, make the bundles, and then ready them for the final baking in the oven.
• Fettucine with bacon/Gorgonzola sauce.  I made the sauce last night except for the addition of the cheese, so that will take all of 5 minutes.
• Roast chicken with garlic, lemon and rosemary.  This will take maybe 15 minutes of prep time and then into the oven for just over 1.5 hours.
• Dessert will be the Elvis Presley pound cake with gelato (I have hazelnut and coconut) drizzed with optional Grand Marnier

Sounds like a good meal, huh? We will drink good French champagne with dinner, as there is much to celebrate!  There will, of course, be leftovers, and I expect to send some home with both my girls.  I do love to cook, especially when I can do a whole meal like this for others.  I don't really have a whole lot of time to cook right now, but with planning, I was able to put this together with my schedule.  This will be a great reward for my big training week, too!

I only have about :45 left to wear the monitor, then I will strip off the electrodes, take off the strap, and go for a swim. After that, I will drive to hospital to drop off the device.  It will take them about 2 weeks to look through the recorded data.  Should be interesting.  I do know that I have a mitral valve prolapse that is nothing to worry about (I had an echocardiogram some years back to confirm), but it will be interesting to me to see what my heart is doing while I exercise now, since it's been so long since I've worn a heart monitor.

Meanwhile, we've upped my levothyroxine so I take 75mcg twice a week (I'm doing it on Monday and Friday), and then we will retest me during my taper.  Man, I really would like to be dialed in for race day, but who the fuck knows what is happening with my body yet?  The fucking science experiment continues...

But despite all this hassle, I continue to be grateful that I am able to keep training and living life to the fullest possible for the moment. Aspects of my life are a royal pain in the ass right about now, but things could be much, much worse.  At some point, we will get my thryoid function dialed in, and then I will get to see how/who I really am!  Can you imagine what my body might be able to do with all my mitochondria working at 100%?  The prospect of that is what keeps me from freaking out about all this.  I mean look what I've been able to do with sub-optimal thyroid function for years.  I think it will feel something like this when I am finally fixed up:

High Holy Day Reminiscing and Further Adjustments

Today is Ironman Hawaii, aka Kona, aka The Big Dance.  I know at least 20 racers there.  I was there myself in 2004 on a lottery slot, but I did my lottery slot proud in a year with howling winds.  Here's my medal and the misspelled mug (it says TriathNlon and ChampionSNip):

Boy do these bring back the memories!  I hadn't pulled out my medal in years.  The mug is reserved for special occasions, like the morning of a really long ride (4+ hours), or race where I think I need to HTFU.  I barely used it in 2012 because I was so miserable and not doing much of anything.  Today I drank out of the mug in celebration of those who are racing Kona today, and I will be on the trainer for 4 hours.

This past Monday, I went to my doctor to discuss my recent medical observations and happenings, and they drew blood for a thyroid panel, which I expected to show that I was hyPERthyroid.  Meanwhile, I'd dropped my levothyroxine dosage by 12.5 mcg in anticipation of dropping it even further once I got the test results back.

On Wednesday, Dr. Ambrose called me personally.  This has never happened, and she started out with, "I've got bad news."  I didn't flinch or panic, I just waited.  She told me I'm actually hyPOthyroid, even worse than I've ever measured at.   We had a little chat about have I ever experienced slight mania?  I guess I have, it typically happens at some point in an Ironman training cycle, but I observe the same thing with other people.  She knows I am naturally a little "hyperactive" (for lack of a better word unless you call it Crackheaded), and wanted to know if I'd ever gone to a very high level.  Well other than feeling "extra happy" the day I ended up in the ER, I'd have to say NO.  But I do seem to have fairly high highs at times, and I've never sweated them.  But then I also have had lows, but the only bad one was last year, and that may correspond to my thyroid crapping out or inordinate amounts of stress and who knows which caused which or whether they were just coincidentally simultaneous?  How about that turn of phrase?  "Coincidentally simultaneous."

This will bear further investigation, and I am going to put together a bunch of data for Dr. Ambrose for the last 12 years or so with my sleeping patterns, major life events and races, and we'll see what we see. Since I know I've been hypothryoid since before I started endurance training, I will try and go back further at a macro level, since I never tracked sleep or anything else before I began doing triathlons.  Or should I say triatNlons ;)

Additionally, Dr. Ambrose said that if I wanted to she'd write an order for me to wear a special heart monitor for 24 hours to see if there is anything odd going on there.  I'm going to strap it on next Tuesday.  Even though my BP has settled back down, and for the most part I'm not experiencing palpitations, I think it will be worthwhile to do this exercise in case it catches something.

Finally, I get to increase my levothyroxine dose somewhat since I'm hypo again.  I have a theory about this that the training stress impacts my thryoid function (to a hyPO state), but that it simultaneously induces a somewhat hyper, manic state.  There is precedence for this, but it is rare to be both manic and hypothyroid at the same time.  But then again, who has studied ultra athletes in detail?  I'm thinking my doctor could write a research paper on me.  One thing I want to do is test my thyroid function every 6-8 weeks for a few months just to see what it does in relation to my training volume.  I think that could show what's going on, but we won't know until we do it.  I am 100% certain my doctor has never worked with someone just like me, so I hope at least she finds the experience interesting!

Meanwhile, I fell with 3.5 miles to go in my long run on Thursday.  Luckily, I fell on the pads of my hands.  I slightly bruised my right knee and my left forearm, and I also hit on my left boob, not sure how, but I can't see a bruise there.  However, I strained my external obliques, so I'm applying Flector (NSAID) patches to them until they settle down.  Funny thing is the crash didn't make me panic or anything, since I was having such a good run (ended up at 14.4 miles in 2:08) and enjoying myself, and I was able to run back home after getting a few ice packs from the grade school nurse!  I was also able to swim yesterday, so all systems are still go.

So to summarize, I am quite unique, and while I had become tired of all the doctor visits and tests and such, I am actually glad that we may finally figure out what's going on with my physiology.  It would be really nice to have my thyroid function 100% for IMCOZ.  If the current step in dosage is correct, I should be there.  Funny I haven't achieved my optimal TSH of 2 so far this year.  I really wonder what it will feel like to be there and race that way?  I really wish I could test myself much like diabetics do--that's what makes all this thyroid crap annoying, but I just have to deal.

Speaking of IMCOZ, they have posted the start list and there is at least one gal much faster than me, so I don't know about a Kona slot.  But that's OK, I am just glad I feel good despite my body doing weird things, I'm going, I'm racing with a huge smile on my face being grateful for the opportunity, and my day will be whatever it will be.

Life is still good, I'm still happy, and now I get on my bike and then I get to watch KONA!!!