Found it...

Yesterday, after 40 minutes of writing, I somehow lost my blog post by hitting the wrong button.

Thanks to Adena, I found it, it was in the drafts section. The good news is the replacement blog post was better.

As you can see, today's picture is a little unusual. Can you guess who it is? No, it's not me. The masked wonder is Al "The Hammer" Nolan.

It was a picture from his recent Mexican vacation. The one where the resort blew up. For those that know Al from the beer run, you can see he's looking good, he's lost weight and is firmer.

I've spoke to Al and I'm coaching him and motivating him for next years Battle Royal at the HOP Beer Run. Al will be my hired gun. I'm his manager, he's my muscle. I can hardly wait to see him and Tank-O rumble. I think it will be pay-per-view worthy, unless Matty-0 has two beers and some chicken nuggets. If so, Tank-O will be crying like a baby because of his Tummy-O before it even starts.

Al is not only a blog follower, he's a family friend and one of my brothers best friends. Al and I grew up in Winnipeg and have known each other since we were 15 years old. Al used to be quite a good cross country runner in high school. He was a lean, mean, running machine.

In just the past few months Al's decided to get back into shape. He's been reading my blog for at least a year or two and in that time he wanted to get in shape and talked about it a lot and even bought a bike a year ago and still didn't commit to it.

This summer something changed. Al started going to an early morning boot camp at a buddy's place. The next thing I know is Al is firm and looking good, actually GREAT. Now the plan is for us to do a triathlon together this summer, Al's first and hopefully a half Ironman. Even Julia, his better half, is thinking about getting into triathlons. Good on you Al, keep up the good work.

Before I move on to another topic, I have one last thing to say about Al and that mask. First off, without even talking to Al, I can guarantee you that at one point during his vacation he was running around Juila in that hotel room with only the mask on. Guaranteed.

Secondly, Al had some fun with the mask at the resort, and I quote from the email he sent me:


I actually bought three masks from the guy and thought Julia and I could do some role playing, but I ended up drinking too much and things didn't work out as planned. I got drunk and wore that mask all evening around this 5 star resort and was growling at people and telling them the Ass Cracker was going to get them. Most were very unimpressed. Too funny.  

Oh how I wished I was there, bugging people in anonymity. How beautiful is that?!

On the training front, I had a bit of an epiphany the other day as I was stretching. As obvious as this sounds I felt that I need to be careful or I'll lose all the fitness I gained and gain all the weight I lost.

As it stands now, I just hit the scales at 189 lbs and I DO NOT want to hit that 190 lb mark. My best is 179 lbs and I'm happy around 181 lbs. One of the reasons I haven't set the date for the Training Payne Kona party is that I'm afraid that it will push me into 190 lb's. I'm scared, I'd rather be at 185 lbs before the P-A-R-T-Y.

I've really changed my training focus. For most of the year it was performance based training and by the time Kona came around, no matter how much I trained I was going in the wrong direction. My body was too worn out and in need of recovery. My current focus is to rebuild and recover.

Recovery focused is a wonderful way to train. I care absolutely 0% about speed. I'm more focused on keeping the workouts easy. Even my weight training is all about long, slow reps and full extension. My stretching is the same. It's all about going back to basics.

In doing so, I've found my motivation to train has returned. I'm feeling similar to how I felt three years ago. The workouts are pressure-less and enjoyable, much more Zen like. All I care about right now is rejuvenating my body with the perfect training balance. Training enough that the body can easily recover from the session and still has time to repair and re-build the old damage.

My run tonight was one of the best I've had in such a long time. I didn't get out the door until around 8:30 pm and my brain was fried from working through some problems. I knew that I NEEDED to go for a run. I knew I'd feel like a new man when I returned, even thought it was a relatively short run.

I was right, I felt like a new man. Nothing is as good at clearing the mind and de-stressing like exercise. Even though I LOVE beer, it takes a second place to exercise for immediate stress relieve.

One of the reasons my run was so enjoyable was because I have a potentially BIG announcement to make, and no, it's not that I'm retiring from blogging again. I don't want to say no more, other than it's going to be made on 11:24.

One very last thing, I want to officially thank the following people for their recent contributions to the TPPF. They made their donations AFTER I announced I was shutting down the blog. How cool is that!!! I also want to add that David O'Sullivan made the donation a day or two AFTER he lost his job. I told him when I get to Nashville, all the beer is on me.

Thanks You, in the order recieved.
Kevin Neuman - $25
Kathryn Murphy - $20
Doru Sandor - $75 (now third largest contributor)
David O'Sullivan $25

Thanks again, your money will be spend on beer, and not wasted on frivolous stuff.


Tempo Run - 41:29 / 8.20 km / 5:03 pace.