guess who's in triathlete magazine

i received a call the other day from liz, one of my teammates from ironteam.  she said that she was given the newest issue of "Triathlete" magazine, and that we were in it.  so, i went on a hunt and tried to find it.   finally, rei said they had the issue.  sooo, i had do it.  i bought all 5 issues they had.  

as soon as i got there, i flipped right to page 176 where she said it was.  and there we all were.  janice, who got us that close, has her back to the camera talking to the gentleman sitting behind us, liz has a full shot, and i have most of my face in there.  WOO HOO!

can you see me?  that's the side of my face!

update post ironman

i haven't written a blog since ironman and sooo much has already passed.  besides me catching up and now maintaining a constant work load at my full-time job, i have been able to spend more time with the ones i love.  

the weekend after ironman, my parents invited my family over to watch the videos they got to see in louisville.  one was a video that was put together by our loving team in training staff (mike kyle, if you are reading this, that includes you).  the other was put together by the ironteam.  they were able to get a better idea and feel a little hint of the emotional weekend.

i was also able to spend time with my sister and cousin jessica at the "scrappinescape" scrapbook crop.  it was a great weekend.  i added pages to my ironman scrapbook and am currently working on the second book.  along with having fun in each other's company and working on our scrapbooks, we all won prizes.  jessice won lots of "stretching game" prizes, janice won the 1st GRAND PRIZE, and i won the 2nd place grand prize, and "the last cropper standing" prize for both nights.

here are some of the pages i did:

on saturday night, jessica and i took a break from the crop and went to the JANET JACKSON concert.  she is one of my VERY FAVORITES.  and jessica discovered just how big of a fan that i was when i was screaming out the words to every song, even when no one else knew them.  =)

here are some clips from the night:

HAPPY HAPPY CONCERT GOERS!!!

Ironman Race Report

My morning started off at 4am. Suprisingly, I woke up with all the energy in the world. I got dressed and made sure for one last time I didn't need anythging else in my special needs bags. So, me and Phil left to get my bagel. Standing in line I see Larry and Bobbie. They tell me that I'm the only one out of the room...woo hoo kudos for me! I'm in the lobby with more Ironteamers now, but my parents are still no where to be found. I don't have my phone so I call from Bobbie's. I tell them that I'm going down to the transition area to drop off my bags. So, on we (me, phil and other Ironteamers) go.

Drop my bags off, put the bottles on my bike, and look around for where we get body marked. Finally, someone knows and tells me it's at the swim start. I find Phil, who has since connected with my parents (thank lord) and off we go again. This time to the swim start. We get there and I see the line to get marked and just yell nonchallantly "OK, BYE!!!" I'm so anxious I don't even hug or kiss anyone bye before I go off into what seems like to me the darkness. I get maked and walk towards the swim start...WOO HOO! I FOUND JANICE (my teammate, not my sister)! She is 8th in line, so that makes me 9th in line. (I told all of you I would be one of the first ten!) Thank you Greg for driving Janice to the start. So we get settled and Liz comes to join us. They move us down the pier and then down the pier again. It's coming close to the start, so I take in my Cliff Shot. Someone sings the national anthemn and shortly after I put on my swimcap. Oh no! It's almost time. The cannon goes off for the pros and we watch them all swim all over each other. That means only 10 minutes left until our turn. The count down begins and in seconds, Janice, me and Liz get in. My heart is racing and there are too many people near me, I side stroke and back storke until I am ready to really catch my groove. My dad later tells me that when he seen me side stroke he said, "Oh no, side stroke ALREADY! She's tired already?!" Little do they know... I finally calm myself down and catch my groove, there are people around me but I'm pretty secure in where I am. People touch, kick and splash water on my face everyone once in awhile, but I don't let that get in my way. I just think keep moving forward, head down, elbows up. I get on my back several times, and have to get back on track b/c being on my back has made me go crooked. I even look at my watch a couple of times, thinking ok if the last person got in at 730am, and+ I'm already almost half way there, I'm good. I see the bridge and think, should I be swimming out to catch the current, but I feel the current of all the people around me and decide to ride that instead. Sooner than I expect, I look up and see the people on the shore. I get to the second to last bouy and think, you are almost there, just keep it strong and steady. I get out of the water and am soooo elated, I look everywhere to see my parents and Phil. Instead, I see flames and wave soooooo happily. I got out in 1:44:12. WOO HOO! My parents and Phil are no where to be found. I find out later that they are waiting at the swim finish worrying b/c there are only a couple of people left in the water. They ask Larry, and he tells them I've been out for almost an hour. HAHAHAHAHA!

So off to my bike. Get my transition bag, tell the volunteer just dump it all out. Get my stuff together, and off on my bike I go. I keep thinking to myself, slow and steady, you don't want to be future roadkill. Like all the coaches say, everyone is passing me. That's fine. There I go happily on my bike, so elated by the fact, I finished my swim soooo well and I'm really doing this. I just keep going. Mile 11 here come the hills, but bring it on, I'm ready. Ok, sorry after that, I have no reclection of milage. I know I'm going on the out and back, woo hoo there's a big down hill, got to love those. As I'm speeding down hill, passing all the people "on your left, on your left" the people coming back are hollering at me to slow down. Grrrrrrrrrrr, although I don't know why, I do. Shortly I see an ambulance in the middle of the road. Go around slowly, and try to get back into my groove. Sadly, my groove never fully came back. But, I still went on. Just keep moving forward. The heat was getting to me, so I pulled off the road more than a couple of times, to douse myself with water and catch my breath. Is it me or is it kindda hard to breathe? And then on one of those hills in the middle of the trees, somehow my chain gets stuck inbetween gears and I can't push my pedal down. Damn, here we go! I fall over and get another nasty gash on my leg. The blood is streaming down, but it's so hot, it dries in place. Sorry, I know that was gross. Who cares, done this before get up! I get up but notice my left handle bar is crooked. Thankfully Brian sees me and helps me pull it back into place. Deliriously, I say "Thanks, Kevin." And, as he says, "It's Brian," I'm already thinking oops that's Brian. Get on my bike again, dammit, my seat is crooked. I think "eff it" just go, but it's soooo crooked I have to get off and fix it. So, off I go again, omg serioulsy, my damn brake is rubbing. So I get off again and fix that. Finally I'm, on my way again. I'm going and going and trucking along, stopping every so often as little as I can to pour some water on me and catch my breathe. Really, is the air that thick?! And here comes that same hill, why does my chain drop. Get off and fix it. Off we go again. It's getting later and later, and everyone on Ironteam has already passed me if not twice already. At the transition areas, I aske what the cutoff is, when did the last person get in the water? No one knows. I see people under the trees laying down. People walking their bikes. People that have defeat written all over their face and movements. I think, just keep moving you don't know when the last person got in. After the last hill, a race official rides next to me. "You have 10 mins, gooooo you can make it, the bike cutoff is 630." I hustle even more, it's flat now so I'm in my arrows and just gooooo. He comes back to me and says "5 more mins, you have just beyond that bridge, spin those legs, you don't want to cramp up on the run." I see the bridge and hustle harder. I make the turn around into transition and see the clock 6:28, yessssss. Get off my bike and the race official says, "Give me your chip." Confused, I give it to him anyway. I turn to my parents and Phil standing next to Bobbie and Larry. I must've had the look on my face, b/c Bobbie said, "the cut off was 615pm. Booo! My feet hurt, but I'm still energetic. I know I could've given such a good effort on the run. Still, I'm happy that I tried, I gave it my best and never gave up. This experience will always be with me, I have no regrets...I wouldn't trade this day for the world!

less than a week to go

it's now august 25, i have exactly 6 days left until i race my very first ironman. i leave thursday morning and race bright and early on sunday. so while everyone will be still sleeping in their bed, i will be jumping in the water to start my race (starts 7am louisville time).

everyone keeps asking me if i'm ready, and all i can say is "we'll see!" i guess i'm as ready as i'll ever be. i have to take it all one at a time. so first be out of the water in 2 hours and 20 mins. next obstable is be off my bike by 530pm. after that, i can just do the best i can to make it the finish line in the shortest time possible.

so wish me luck, and pray that i make it through each obstacle.

7/27 Triple Brick = 10.5 hours of training

today's training called for a triple brick, a 30 mile bike ride and a 50 minute run x 3. so in total i did 90 miles on my bike and ran (well, i walked) for 2.5 hours. if you keep up with my blog or even think about what i was anticipating for this training, you would know that i was NOT looking forward to this AT ALL!

well after today's workout, i feel GREAT! i was feeling sore after my ride from yesterday, so today's ride was not as pleasant as i would've wanted. not to mention the headwind that was fighting us, especially going up the hills. but, i powered through the pain and took each 30 mile loop one by one.

today was about milage, so i didn't try to kill myself at every single loop. i just wanted to make sure that i was able to finish and finish strong, which I DID! THANKS MAI for riding with me and introducing me to that great cream. i'm definitely going to get me some.

on a funny note, i've added to my collection of tan lines on my body. if you haven't seen me lately, i am a plethora of colors with tan lines all over. i have tan lines from my swimsuit, bike jersy, tank top, and bikes shorts. with the great danville heat, i added another bike jersy, a watch, my bike gloves, socks again (after i've just even that out), and more bike shorts, annndddd i look like a damn raccoon! sorry no pictures will be posted of this!

bike training 7/26

today i woke up bright and early to get in my bike work out.  it called for a 40 - 70 mile ride or 4 hours max.

mike and elaine had us meet at the corner of edgewood and canada in redwood city/san carlos.  they mapped out about a 51 mile course.  and, it was a great day for a ride today!  if i had taken any longer though, the heat might have gotten to me.  good thing i've gotten faster.  =)  as you can tell, i'm pretty happy with the ride i got in today.

normally, i ride just about 10 miles an hour, really slow!  when i got to the turn around point at about mile 31, it was a little after 2 hours, which means i was going just under 15 mph.  woo hoo!  big difference for me.  and, i didn't let myself get too apprehensive when i seen the hills.  you see, normally, when i see a hill, small or big, i tend to settle in wayyyyyy too soon and go REALLY SLOWLY, thinking to myself "slowly but surely."  this time, i attacked each hill pushing the boundaries of my comfort zone.  and i reminded myself on all the straight aways, that "the flats are n0t for resting."  i think that deserves another smiley face.  =)  

on the way to our turn around point, coach mike reminded me that we are going to have a very big day tomorrow and to take it fairly easy.  so i slowed down a bit, and didn't attack the hills as hard as i was during the first half.  in the end, i averaged about 12mph, so still i had a great ride.

can't say i'm looking forward to tomorrow.  we are doing a triple brick that will be lasting 10 hours or more.  =/  so please pray that i can make it home.  hahaha!  i'm sure i will, but will be in great agony on the drive home.  wish me luck!

swimming triumph 7/15

this is what my workout called for:

Warm Up
-300 (G2=400, G3=500)
-6x50 (CU,s) 10” RI
=4x50 (CFS,s) 10” RI
Main Set
-10 x 100 L5 10”RI
Do not go faster than L5 which is your Ironman pace and the pace you will maintain on the next swim. Do these with 10”R rather than on an interval and keep track of your total time. Think about how this pace feels so that on race day you will know the feeling you are trying to maintain – long – strong - relaxed
-1000 L5
Your goal is to swim this in a time that equals the total time of the previous set less 1 ½ minutes (the 9x10seconds of rest you had)
Warm down
-200
Totals: G1=3000 (120 laps total)

i'm sure most of you don't know what your are reading above, but basically i was swimming in a 25 meter pool, so if i am to swim a 300, i will have to swim 12 laps. now that i have that little tid bit out of the way, i can tell you why i'm sooooo happy. the second part of my main set call for a 1000, 40 laps non-stop. now, usually if you need to rest while you are swimming, and you cannot stop on the wall, you can do a resting stroke. a resting stroke is like the side stroke or a back stroke, so you can take the time to breathe a little deeper, if needed. I WAS ABLE TO SWIM 38 TOTAL LAPS WITHOUT EVEN DOING A RESTING STROKE. lap 35 and lap 38 were my resting stroke, but i'm sure if i pushed myself harder, i could've done the whole set with out resting. =)

i've never gone so far without taking a resting stroke before. WOO HOO!

clearlake training weekend

this past weekend was a really big weekend for me. friday afternoon, i hitched a ride with my mentor, john, to clearlake for our training weekend. saturday morning started really early. we had to be at a former teammate, jeff's house by 630am. we were in the lake by 7am. we swam course they set up for us which was supposed to be about 2miles, but everyone thinks it was a little over 2 miles. they didn't give us our time as we came out, but i was right behind my teammate janice, who thinks we came out in about an hour and a half. =) big smiles from me b/c if i keep swimming like that, i'll definitely make my swim cutoff. remember, on race day, i have to finish 2.4 miles in 2 hour and 20 mins.

so after the swim we transitioned to our bikes. the bike course was about 96 miles, broken up into 4 parts, with water stops along the way (thank lord!) so i got my bike stuff on and reached my first stop. i was feeling really optimistic so i started to head out to the second stop by myself. i'm really slow on my bike, so i figured everyone behind me would catch up. after awhile, i realized i was back at the street we hit before, so i took out my directions and was going the wrong way! so, i headed back to the first stop and started my second part all over again. i was waived down by my coaches and was told to meet up with helen and coach alex and to finish out that part of the ride with them. i had a really hard time on part 3, it was about 100 degrees out and the sun beaming off the cement made it feel even harder. i tood some really long breaks but somehow managed to muster up the strength to finish out my ride. anyhow, b/c my my little detour i did an extra 12 miles! so when i finished my bike course i did a little over 100 miles! big accomplishment for me. WOO HOO!

sunday, we got to sleep in an extra hour. we had to be at our meeting spot at 730am. i ran my 12 miles and came back in to one of the best smoothies i've ever had. i don't know if it was b/c of the heat and i needed something cold in my system or what, but it sure felt good.

to my coaches, thank you for the support and the opportunity to join you for the best training weekend i've ever had. to the volunteers, thank you for the all the encouraging words. your bells and whistles made it all much easier too!

GO TEAM!

NO PAIN, NO GAIN...

My training this weekend was pretty hard. It tested my endurance, my strength, my commitment, and most of all my mental toughness. My weekend training started on Friday afternoon with 2 spin classes back to back. I actually only did about one and a half classes. I caught the tail end of the first class and stayed for the second. If you know Coach Elaine, you know taking one of her classes is already brutal! To top off the 2 spin classes, at the end of the second class, she had us do walking lunges.

Needless to say, my legs and butt were on fire on Saturday morning. But, we are now in "Race Phase" and I'm only about 3 months away from race day, so missing training is not an option. Saturday's training called for a 10 mile run. Coach Elaine and Coach Mike had us meet in Oakland for a trail run. The trail had some pretty tough hills so I jogged/walked, and the hills of course added to my legs and butt that were already on fire. Woo hoo for pain! =P

Needless to say, I needed some coercing to get to training on Sunday. Sunday called for a swim and a 90 mile bike ride. With my legs about to fall off, I didn't know how I was going to handle this. Thank Lord I have Phil to kick me out of bed and remind me about how close my actual race day is, anddddd cook me breakfast. =) So my training started at 8am with a swim in a lagoon in Redwood City. I swam only for a little while as I wanted to save my legs for the 90 mile ride. Although I only finished 60 miles of the 90, this ride was the toughest ride I've done BY FAR! In my estimation at least 80% of this ride was climbing. =O With my legs already feeling the pain which was even worse by now, I already was feeling defeat at the start of the ride. But, I rode through the pain and got through some of the toughest hills of my riding life. The hardest hill had a 6 mile climb. Can you imagine riding a bike on a STEEP incline for 6 miles? I'll admit I had to get off and walk a couple of times and I even cried b/c this hill had really killed my spirits. But, we got to the top of the hill finally got to the turn we were looking for b/c this hill really seemed like it had NO END!!! We had to get home so we kept going, Coach Mike and Coach Pete picked me up about mile 60 since it was getting cold and about to be dark. I got back to my car at almost 7pm. So I trained from 8am to 7pm, rode from Redwood City to Saratoga and almost back! Although, I've done more miles than this before, like I said, THIS HAS BEEN THE TOUGHEST RIDE BY FARRR!

Although this ride had me thinking some really negative thoughts, I know all this pain will ultimately help me in the end. All the pain I'm suffering from now will only help me on race day. Phil, thank you for being my annoying reminder b/c my lazy ass definitely needs a kick from time to time. And, mostly thank you for supporting me with all the talks when I start to second guess myself and knowing what do to get me where I need to be. Elaine, thank you for the talk this morning. I definitly needed the support and the encouragement after yesterday's training. And it means a lot b/c you know where I'm coming from. And, I'm glad you all can see that I'm definitely pushing myself past limits I've never thought I had. I never would have imagined doing any of this and to know all that I've accomplished already makes me feel even more determined to finish my IRONMAN!

Thank you everyone for understanding why I'm so M.I.A. and supporting me with all your encouragement.

janice x2 = inspiration

on saturday, i rode a trail that was a total of 60 miles. it was a pretty demanding trail and i definitely had to push my limits once again, especially when you are climbing up a long and tough grade with the wind pushing against you. but, i do feel myself getting more comfortable on my bike and keeping track of my nuitrition. and i don't feel so anxious when i see hill anymore as i've learned to take it "one pedal stroke at a time." =)

on saturday, i had two janice's in mind keeping me going. janice, my teammate, is a mom on seven, a grandma and an awesome teammate. she was smoking me on the trail and i kept thinking "keep up with her." one, b/c i knew we both needed to end as soon as possible, we had places to be, and two, b/c i didn't want to get lost! she's awesome!

the other janice, is my sister. i was trying to be done and race back to the school as soon as possible b/c i did NOT want to miss my sister's black belt ceremony. so i kept my eye on my clock and my milage and kept calculating in my head..."i've gone this many miles in this amount of time, i should be back by this time"..."more than half way there"...anyhow, i made it right on time with my birght sign and all!


CONGRATULATIONS!!!

71 miles on my bike

training this weekend was pretty hard. i actually did the most mileage on my bike yesterday. i was supposed to ride out 82 miles, but i ended with 71 miles under my belt. =) the ride had some rolling hills, which i've learned to love b/c i can speed down the hill and almost ride about half way up my next hill, which means less work for me. =P i'm not sure what my highest speed was yesterday, i'd have to check, but the last i checked, i hit up to 25.1 miles per hour. funnnn! but, there were many many huge hills on this ride, i tackled all of them on the way to the turn around point, but coming back was a bit of a challenge. i fell coming up a hill b/c i was a bit fatigued and got some more war wounds. really, my knees are all bruised, i was malled by one of my gears, and i have a nasty bruise on my hip. but, i got up and rode out to 71 miles. coach mike and coach pete saved me at mile 71 b/c the course was a little too hard than they anticipated. and, i've learned i REALLY need a new bike seat b/c after 71 miles my rear is NOT happy.

overall, i'm really glad i got to tackle this ride and am happy with the mileage i put in.

even more accomplished

as my training goes on, it keeps getting harder and harder and i keep progressing =). this weekend we camped out at lake san antonio and we had our half iron distance race on saturday. soooo...essentially i would have to swim 1.2 miles, bike 56 miles, and run 13.1 miles.

the swim was quite pleasant, as it was in a lake, and not the COLD & SALTY bay. the water was cold but definitely not as cold as aquatic park and we didn't have the waves fighting us. my swim went quite well, i finished in 54mins, and i beat my projected time by 4 mins =)!!! i would've been faster if i could swim straight and swam more by the shore, but that's something i can work on.


we all know that biking is my weakest point, so when everyone was warning me that this was one of the hardest bike courses for triathlons, i was not looking forward to it AT ALL! as i said this was a 56 mile course, so this weekend was the furthest that i rode my bike ever! not to mention all the hills and the biggest one of all called "NASTY GRADE." trust me it was VERY NASTY! i had to take a rest a little before getting to the top (and i was soooo exhausted that i couldn't clip out in time and fell over), but i finished it....and i didn't walk my bike up like some people. i was determined to get this done. although the ironman bike course is double the distance, it is not as hard as this course, so if i can conquer this, i'm sure to conquer the ironman course.

here is a picture of just the bike course and an elevation map so you can see what i'm talking about when i say it one of the hardest triathlon courses and you can see the elevation of "NASTY GRADE"

i also got to meet one of the cutest honorees. his name is TYLER. he's only 5 years old and he has the courage to fight with cancer. this is why i fundraise.

Ironteam bootcamp

this weekend was a pretty crazy weekend. i worked out for 15+ hours just this weekend. i definitley pushed through my comfort zone and was pretty amazed at what i had accomplished by the end of bootcamp.

saturday, started off at 8am at aquatic park. i swam in the bay AGAIN! woo hoo for me. they had a little obstacle course set up for us where we would have to swim to a buoy and back, run up to the beach, and do an exercise. after the first buoy we had to do jumping jacks, after the next we did hinge push ups, and the next we did wheelbarrel races and then we had to swim around the last buoy and across all the other buoys we swam around and then run back up the beach. (i hope i explained that well enough so you can picture it) i don't know how the others felt about it, but i thought it was fun.

then it was off to the sports basement in the presidio. i missed the ride on the road, but we jogged over to green street where they have these MASSIVE stairs. and by massive i mean they go FOREVER and they are super STEEEEEEEP. then we ran back to sports basement and did a spin. Ran along the presido towards the bridge and spun again. Then ran to the safeway and did some core stuff, then back to our cars. we finish a little after 4pm.

sunday, our workout was in san jo, at gunderson high school. our day started off at 8am again! we started in the pool and swam for about an hour. then coach pete took me for a ride on my bike. i had to go up another MASSIVE hill, and nearly cried as i was climbing up. but, I MADE IT! but, b/c i missed the ride the day before, i had to do it twice, but only half way. and i did it again! woo hoo! omg if only you could see this street... then it was back to the school and we did two sets of spin/runs. our day ended at 3pm.

overall, i pushed myself beyonds limits with the help of coach elaine, coach pete, coach joe from the south bay team. THANK YOU!!! i swam really well in the bay and i got up the massive hills on my bike. and i know this may seem like a really little thing, but i can get my water bottle out of my water cage while riding...woo hoo!

so if you guys see me please don't be suprised that i'm super dark and have major tan lines...

swim marker

every so often we are told to do a swim marker so see how far we can swim in 30 minutes. i was very please with myself this time around as i DRAMATICALLY IMPROVED! ;) the last couple of times i only did about 31 or 32 lengths of a 25 meter pool, this time i did 40 lengths. WOOHOO! anddddd...i still had a minute and some left, i didn't want to go another lap b/c i would be able to hear the beep of my watch, so i just ended it there.

weekend update

i started the weekend off early on saturday morning. i met some of the IRONTEAM on van ness near aquatic park at 8am. coach mike and coach elaine mapped out a course of about 13 miles around the city and we were supposed to be done in about 1 hour and a half. i could never finish 13 miles in an hour and a half, so lesley did a moderation course and turned around after about 50 minutes, i followed. we ended up running for about an hour and 47 minutes. when i got home phil and i went to his nephew, cj's game. then it was off to phil's gig. he dj'd an 18th birthday party and i mc'd.

my sunday morning started at 8am again. i didn't get much sleep b/c of the party the night before andddd we lost an hour due to daylight savings. i definitely needed to IRONMAN UP today...and i did! =) we started out with a spinnerval, ran for 10 minutes and then we rode around lake merced and the surrounding neighborhood and ran for 10 minutes and i did it all again. the day was really nice today, i even got a couple of tan lines. and i got my first war wound b/c i bit it the second time we rode out. =P today was definitely a trying work out. but, i got through it with the help of coach pete, coach alex, coach elaine, coach larry, and coach izumi. THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR SUPPORT. i wouldn't have been able to make it through the day, especially the second ride, without you guys.

IRONMAN UP!

we were introduced to a new phrase this week, IRONMAN UP!, basically it means "man up." we were told whenever we are having a hard time doing our workout, especially when we have to wake up at the butt crack of dawn and drive to he boonies and do a long workout in the pouring rain, that we need to IRONMAN UP! this weekend, i sure can say I IRONMAN'D UP!

yesterday, we did about a 6+ mile run, swam in the pool for about 1.5 hours, and did a total body conditioning for an hour with coach elaine...trust me that's a workout in itself, and extra challenging since it was after a very demanding workout. for the run yesterday, they mapped out a course for us around the neighborhood that we ran 3 laps around. they say it was about 6 miles long, but the pedometers that people were using said it was closer to 7 or 8 miles. either way I RAN (jogged) THE WHOLE WAY, DIDN'T WALK ONCE! we were in the pool for about an hour and a half and of course did some very hard drills and workouts.

today, we were in the pool for about 2 hours and did a bike/run brick, 3 x 30 min bike, 15 min run, 10 min core. we were all sooooooo sore from yesterday, i didn't think that i was going to be able to finish the workout today. in the pool, coach alex helped me learn how to not rest on the side of each wall. today, i didn't use the wall at all except in between sets...annnnnd it was a 50 meter pool, not your usual 25 meter. our bikes, were set up in the boy's locker room b/c it was raining the whole time. but that didn't stop us from swimming, or running and doing core in the rain. i know i'm definitely going feel this tomorrow b/c i already feel this now. =P

february 19th

so yesterday i had a really tough training day. i don't know what it was, but i was feeling really sluggish and it was really hard to get through my workout. if you haven't noticed a trend, tuesdays and thursdays are my swimming days, so of course i had a date with the pool once again.

although i was feeling sluggish and i did think to cut it short a couple of times, i pushed myself through and finished the whole set. i also pushed myself to shorten my breaks after each lap and not take a break at all on some...just 50s (2 laps), but it's progress.

here's what i did yesterday:
Warm Up
300 L36x50 (choice drill,s) 10" RI
4x50 L5 15"RI
Concentrating on consistent stroke count
Main Set
3x50 L7 20"RI (G2=4x50 G3=5x50)
Try to maintain good technique with the speed
3x100 L5 15"RI (G2=4x100 G3=5x100)
Pick 3 techniques and concentrate on 1 for each 100 (balance, rotation, front quadrant, extension, power phase, exhaling completely under water, tempo, etc)
3x150 L5 15"RI (G2=4x150 G3=5x150)
Breathing every 3 strokes or if that is normal, every 3 onthe odd laps and every 5 on the even laps
3x200 15"RI (G2=4x200 G3=5x200)
Decend (the time for each 200 gets faster by 3-4 seconds)
Warm down
200 perfect
Totals: G1=2500 <~~THAT'S 100 LAPS!

training

today i had to run for 95 minutes.  we had an on your own day today, but coach elaine let us all know that she would be running in the city.  i decided to join her.  we ran from aquatic park on van ness towards the ball bark along the piers for about 47 minutes and back.  i made it a little past pier 38 and only walked sparingly, i jogged almost the WHOLE  way.  =)

happy valentine's day

for valentine's day this year, i had a date with the pool. hahaha...did you all think i was gonna get mushy? today was one of the hardest days i've had in the pool. our training is getting longer and harder and it is definitely pushing me to limits that i've never thought i'd hit. but, finishing the olympic distance triathlon and the half marathon has boosted my confidence. and, although i am still very nervous about the big big big race, i'm happy with how far i've already come.

today, the hardest thing i had to do was swim 2 x 500 meters (20 laps, 40 total) non-stop. so i couldn't take my usual break after every lap. and, I DID IT! i was really really happy when i was finished.

here's what my whole workout looked like:

Warm Up

300 L3

6x50 (choice drill,s) 10" RI

2x50 L5 15"RI Concentrating on accelerating the hand through the pull

Main Set

4x100 L5 15"RI Use tempo trainer and concentrate on one skill in each 100to see if it makes a difference in how hard or easy it is to maintain thecorrect pace. If you don't have a tempo trainer, time yourself and see ifyour time varies with each emphasis

1-balance (press the chest in)

2-front quadrant (or ½ catchup)

3-power (hold the water throughout the pull)

4-extension (extend the reach in front, feel it in your armpit)

2x500 L4 20"RI (G2=3x500 G3=4x500) Relaxed steady swim but you can go through your mental inventory ofskills DO NOT rest on the walls at all - no extra breaths - touch and go.If you need a "breather" do a couple of strokes alternate swim (head upfree, sculling, breast, or back) but do not stop forward progress, and continue right back into regular swimming

Warm down

200 perfect

it hurts so good!

the course, 13.1 miles

me, before the pain

me with the pain (i also lost my headband)

my medal

today i participated in my very first marathon. it was the kaiser permanente half marathon, 13.1 miles. JESS AND REGGIE thank you so much for the ride. and jess thank you for running with me the first couple of miles...sorry i couldn't keep up =P.

the first couple of miles i was averaging at 12 minutes each time. i started hurting more after mile 9. and as i was approaching mile 10 it started pouring so hard it was hard to see. the last 3 miles were the hardest. but all the cheering and encouragement..."go iron girl," "go team," and seeing my coaches and them cheering me on definitely helped me keep going towards the end. i ultimately finished in 2 hours and 51 minutes. i know, i'm slow =). but, i did get a medal for being one of the first 6,000.

right now i'm in bed typing this and my legs are killing me, but it hurts so good! and at least now i know i can finish a half marathon and i'm on my way to being iron.