Paranoia

About a week ago I went to the doctor's office to have some things checked out and when they weighed me it said 118. The doctor's scale is always a little high so I didn't think anything of it. That afternoon while waiting at the pharmacy I did the self-diagnostic thing and weighed myself and it said 117. Dave said it was always off so again I didn't think anything of it. Yesterday I did my swim at the gym instead of the outdoor pool and stepped on the scale. It said 116. Okay so all the scales must be right, which means I've put on four pounds since I've started training for this triathlon. My mom says it's all muscle and it's all in my calves, but I'm paranoid about my weight. I don't like weighing 116. 116 is close to 120 and I just think that's unacceptable for myself because I workout so much and because being only 5'1" any amount of extra weight shows. Just look at the pictures below. One is of me and one is of my friend Jeannie. She and I have about the same workout regimine and look how much skinnier she is than me. I've got to start eating better and buy a scale.

Okay I am having trouble getting the pictures to work correctly. I'll try again later, I guess.

Maybe All This Training is Paying Off

Yesterday was the Wendy's Triathlon. It's a huge triathlon at Alum Creek that attracts a lot of first timers and is very poorly organized. It's a sprint triathlon that consists of a 1/2 mile swim, 16.8 miles of bike, and a 5K run. I spent all day Saturday working on the patio with Dave and my dad and really didn't feel like racing yesterday, but did really well.

I struggled a little in the swim just because there were a lot of people and no one could swim a straight line. The water was really shallow and at points I would stand up and walk just to get around people who were in my way. Swim time = 14:46.

Knowing that the bike was a lot shorter than what I have been riding I decided to do the best I could and really went after it. It was fun to actually pass people instead of being the one passed all the time. I had a scary moment when I took a turn too quickly and clipped my pedal on the ground. I didn't fall but did veer off into the grass, but recovered well. Bike time = 57:53.

The run went really well, as always, and didn't get passed by anyone. I finished second in my age group on the run only behind Jeannie who's a beast. Run time = 22:36.

Overall I went 1:39:54 and finished 8th in my age group out of 26, which is a much better showing than my previous races. Maybe if I keep working on my bike, I might be a triathlete yet!

Alum Creek Multisport Festival Pictures

This must have been on the first lap of the bike because there are actually people behind me. 


At the finish.  

Alum Creek Multisport Festival Update

The results were posted from the triathlon this past weekend. I finished first in my age group, actually beating somebody. Here's the breakdown of my race:

Swim-32:18
T1-2:29
Bike-2:19:48 (16.0 mph)
T2-1:38
Run-51:43 (8:21)

I don't know about this multisport stuff. I thought I had done pretty good on Sunday despite the horrible bike ride, but now I am thinking that I suck. I thought I was one of the first ones out of the swim, but it turns out I was 10th out of 14. Surprisingly, I was not the worst person on the bike. There were actually three people slower than me (although I think they were all BIG guys). And I was 7th out of 14 on the run, which I think is acceptable. I just really hate being average. I'm not average in running and I want to be better in both multispot and running. There are just not enough hours in the day to get all the training in that I need.

Alum Creek Multisport Festival

Yesterday I did the longest triathlon I am going to do prior to Muncie. The race included a 1.5K swim, 62K bike, and 10K run. The swim was a two loop triangle that was awesome. I love to swim. After I rounded the first buoy I had a hard time seeing the second one and panicked a little. I treaded water and cleared my goggles and freaked out a little about how deep the water was. Then I did a little backstroking until I got my heart rate under control and started to front crawl again. I rounded the second buoy and found swimming into shore was pretty easy because of the current. My second loop was pretty easy and I found I was passing people and was generally just having fun. As I approached the last buoy I was a little disappointed that the swim was over and now it was on to the dreaded bike. The swim took me about 32 minutes.

The first transition was kinda funny. I was really dizzy from the swim and found myself walking sideways through the transition. Eventually I got everything straightened out and I was off on my bike.

Right out of the transition I saw two bikers run into each other and the a woman fell off her bike. I hope she was okay and her skin didn't turn into hamburger meat. She was only wearing a sports bra. The bike was a two loop course and I knew everybody was going to catch me. I took my time, drank when I needed it, and kept my heartrate down. The funniest thing I saw happened going down a hill. This guy flew pass me looping like the wicked witch of the west and he was pedaling like there was no tomorrow. Just as he passed me, his chain fell off and he had to stop to repair. Just made me laugh. Once the first loop was done, I was all alone. In fact, a volunteer told me I was the last person. Great! One of the first out of the water and one of the last ones off of the bike. I sang songs and tried to eat a powerbar (nearly impossible to do on the bike). I encouraged myself by talking to myself and I waved to the volunteers and thanked them. With only about 5 miles left on the bike I got passed by somebody which gave me encouragement that I might be able to catch someone on the run. As I came into the transition area I stood on my pedals and stretched my calves and hamstrings. My bike took about 2:19.

The run started off a little shaky. We ran right down by the beach which was slippery and then we ran on a grass trail which had horrible terrain. I walked this part mostly to take my bib off my shirt and attach it to my short. Then I took my shirt off and ran in my sports bra. It was pretty humid and the shirt was wet and weighing me down. As I got to the road I noticed that there were quite a few people on the run not that far in front of me. So I took little steps and just chopped away at them. By the end of the race I was averaging in the 8:00s and had passed probably 6 or 7 people. I finished in about 3:47.

I have no official time yet or placing, but I feel a lot more confident about doing Muncie.

I hate the 5K!

I hate the 5K. It's just an awful race. It's too short to pace yourself, but it too long to out like a bat out of hell. But a bat out of hell is what I went out like and I crashed and burned. In fact, I walked twice during the race. My first mile was a 6:29 which is just way faster than I should ever be going unless it's a one mile race. Just after the one mile mark I got a severe stitch on my right side underneath my ribs. I tried to slow down my reathing but I was weezing and felt like I was going to have an asthma attack. So, I stopped and walked. One of my high schoolers caught me and said, "What are you doing coach?" So I ran with her a while until I felt better and then took off again. At the turnaround there was a waterstop but the water was in plastic cups and there was ice in it so it was hard to drink adn too cold to pour on yourself. The second mile was a 7:45 which included walking and a waterstop. By the third mile I was starting to feel good again and started picking people off again. But with only a 1/2 mile to go I felt like I have been hit by a truck and did a little more walking. My third mile was a 7:38. My overall time was 22:42 which is a PR by 4 seconds. I should be excited because it's been years since I PRed in a 5K, but I raced so poorly that I am more disappointed than excited.

Why the darn bike?

Why does a triathlon have to involve a bike? Why can't it involve anything else, like inline skating or something? I really hate riding a bike!

Yesterday a group of us met at Alum Creek to do a triathlon run through. We did about a mile of swimming, which for me went pretty well. I decided not to try to spot anything, just try to swim in a straight line and if my hands start hitting bottom, then I know I'm pulling to the right. It helped a lot. Then we did about 16 miles of biking which I totally got left behind. I know I'm not a good biker, but I was really struggling yesterday. Then we did a 5K run which was short of a 5K, but I still did pretty well on.

Thank goodness I had a good 10 mile run on Saturday and the running is what is really important to me.

This week is a fall back week and then I have a long triathlon this coming Sunday.

A picture from the duathlon

I found a picture of me from the duathlon I did this weekend. Don't I look tan? 

Summertime

Don't you just love that song by Will Smith...summer, summer, summertime. Makes me want to dance, but you don't want to see that, unless you've been drinking a lot or I've been drinking a lot and then it's just downright funny.

Anyway, yesterday was a swimming workout that I did in an outdoor swimming pool, hence the reference to summertime. (Get it now?) My swim was 6 X 500, which should have been 6 X 20 laps, but I think the pool was actually a 20 yard pool and I'm not quite sure how that calculates. So, I did 6 X 20 laps anyway. Being that it was a public pool there was only one lap lane and it was full when I got there. I swam beside the lap lane because there were still lines on the bottom of the pool and I thought no one would bother me because there wasn't really anyone close to that side of the pool. As soon as I jumped in, though, people seemed to swarm to that side of the pool and I had to keep the lookout because the others seemed to always want to be in my path. Made me angry. Then the lap lane came available and I moved over there. During the last 20 laps of my swim, I shared it with some other dude. Well, at least I can head back to the gym after this week's renovations.

Today is a bike/run workout so we'll see how that goes considering it's going to be over 90 degrees.

Brutal!

Brutal! Just brutal! That's about the only way I can describe the duathlon I did yesterday. The race was a 5K run, 40K bike, 10K run. As the weather is in Ohio, it happened to be the hottest day of the year during this race and there was no warning. Thursday's weather was in the 60s. Sunday's weather was in te 90s. The first run went over the dam at Deer Creek and included a grassy cross country run. After the first run I was sitting in second place right behind the first place woman. She got out of the transition faster than I did and I didn't see her again. On the bike I got passed by everyone and it wasn't even like I was going slow. I was cruising at 18 mph and I was getting passed like I was sitting still. By the end of the bike, I was sitting in fourth place. The last run sucked. It was so daggone hot that I just couldn't run. There was no air to breathe. I made it through the first 3.1 miles running and walking. On the turnaround I saw Grace and she actually stopped and talked to me. That's how badly this race was going for the bothe of us. With about two miles left I passed a woman for third place and a triathlete caught me and we ran together. It was nice to have someone to talk to. I don't have my official ltime (it's not posted yet) but my watch said 2:51.10. I'm frustrated and a little worried about Muncie, but at the same time, hungry to do better than I did yesterday.

May Totals

May was a busy month for me. I had a lot of track meets and little motivation to get in gear for the triathlon. Here are my monthly totals. I think they're a little on the pathetic side.

Running = 81 miles
Swimming = 5950 yards/meters (I don't know if it's yards or meters)
Biking = 480 minutes = 8 hours

I'm turning a new leaf in June, though, and really hoping to stick to my schedule.