Where did summer go???

I can't believe today is the last day of August. This summer has just flown by and it didn't even feel like summer. Not many hot days.

Last year this time I had just finished Ironman Louisville and a couple weeks later it was the end of my season. This year the end of my season is not going to be over until after Clearwater on November 14th. Then it will be a month break before I begin training for Ironman China.

I was busy all day and did my training tonight, at least the weights portion. When I got to the YMCA, the pool was closed. Turns out it's closed for the next two weeks. Now that I think of it, they did the same thing last year, but I was recovering from the Ironman and it didn't effect me.

I guess I need to find another pool for the next couple of weeks. I was able to do my weight training but took it easy on the legs. The top of my left knee and the back of my right knee has been bothering me for a couple of weeks, so I figured I'd forgo some leg exercises. Better to be safe than sorry.

In less than two weeks I'm doing Ironman Muskoka 70.3. Next Thursday the Sohor's arrive from Winnipeg to stay at my place and do the race. Davis has been training hard and really wants to qualify for Clearwater. It would be great if he did.

Since I saw that movie Halloween II, I've been a little paranoid. Last night I forgot to mention that on my run, my shadow scared me a couple of times and when I ran by someone who looked strange, my "spidey senses were tingling" and I'd glance back to make sure everything was okay. Tonight was the same thing, when I got into my truck after training and it was dark. I was laughing at myself, 43 years old and looking over my shoulder.

Today's picture is of Alyssa and Reid at the Horror Show. They got their picture with the main characters in the movie "Rock, Paper, Scissors - the way of the tosser" that has just come out on DVD. I think it's a Napoleon Dynamite type movie. I guess now we'll have to rent it and check it out.

Weights - 35:00

August Totals

Swim - 9.3 miles / 15 km

Bike - 514.89 miles /830.47 km

Run - 118.44 miles / 191.03 km

Weights - 6 sessions

Totals - 642.63 miles / 1036.50 km

Calories - 48,452

89

Slashing and a Crashing...

Got to bed fairly late, the neighbors had a farewell party for their daughter who was leaving for college today. It was a very emotional time for her, especially with the boyfriend issue.

I didn't get moving until around 11 am and decided to put my long run off till the evening. Yesterday at the Horror Expo I told the kids we would go to Halloween II this afternoon. The horror expo was incredible and packed with people. I think they said they had over 50,000 inside and had us stand at the door outside the building until some people left. When we did get in, the line up to get tickets was hundreds deep.

When we got in, the place was filled with nerds and geeks, many in costumes. Lots of Star Trek and Star Wars people. Some of the costumes were amazing, especially the horror ones. Some people had eye balls that looked real, hanging out of their sockets. They had lots of stars like Linda Hamilton and Leonard Nimoy signing autographs for $40 each. And believe it or not there was long line ups of people waiting to get autographs.

Today's movie was too gruesome for me. I don't know how many people Michael Myers killed, but it was a lot. Reid and Alyssa seemed to enjoy it and I was just waiting for it to be over. As it was playing, I was thinking I should have sent them by themselves and went for a run, but in retrospect I'm glad I did the family thing instead.

Movies are so expensive, especially the popcorn and drinks, although the theatre does give you free refills. As we were leaving I had them refill my popcorn and diet coke. I told the kids that I'm going to keep the bag and cup and take it with me next time we go to a movie. I don't think they have a statute of limitations on free refills.

I went for my run at 8 pm and it was a night run. It was too dangerous to take my normal country road long run so I ran through the city on the sidewalks. It was good, I needed a break from learning on my computer. I ran slow the first half and ended up having negative splits.

Ten minutes from home I noticed that my feet were skimming along the ground and that I needed to be careful that I didn't hit a crack in the side walk and wipe out. Literally seconds after I thought that I hit a crack and went down. I scraped my hand, elbow, knee and wore off part of the fabric on one shoe. Of course that was on the foot with the fracture, boy did that hurt.

I was numb when I got up and was glad no one saw me tumble. It was tough to get going again with my body in a semi state of shock. In a way I felt like a kid again. I thought that I must be in good shape and flexible because I didn't break anything. At my age, breakage is not uncommon.

When I got home I had blood and grime all over my clothes. Reid saw it and started laughing. He said "Karma got you back" and was referring to me wrestling with him last night and opening up a can of whoop ass on him.

Long Run - 1:55:52 / 14.47 miles / 7:59 pace / 135 avg hr / 1472 ft climbing

Another dead soldier...

Got my mind to stop running with thoughts and had an okay sleep. I was looking forward to getting up early and getting my long ride done because the kids want to go to the "horror expo" in Toronto. Apparently a lot of the big time directors and stars of scary movies are going to be there. I have a feeling this is going to be expensive, I saw all kinds of horror stuff that's going to be for sale at the expo.

I love getting up when no one else is a wake. I made a nice carbo loading breakfast, had some coffee, and played on the computer in a peaceful and quiet atmosphere. It's beautiful.

The weather man said it would be rain all day today and tomorrow. Last night I prepared myself mentally for it and wasn't going to let the rain deter me. When I woke up it had just stopped raining and the skies looked like more was to come. I put on a rain jacket and some plastic bags on my feet, I just hate getting wet feet on a ride, and then I was out the door.

Today's ride was the big test to see if the new bike fit and seat was going to feel good going long. Initially I didn't feel too powerful and my left knee was hurting. I thought "oh no" did I adjust my cleats wrong"? I decided to just keep going and see if it continued. After about 30 minutes the discomfort went away and the more I rode the better I started to feel.

I had a good ride listening to my podcasts, some on Internet marketing and some on Ironman Training. There was one called "Ironman Talk" and they had a top triathlon coach named Bobby McGee on the show and he's a big proponent of the run walk theory for Ironman marathons. He had all kinds of stats that you finish faster than just running straight for the entire distance. He has some of his pro athletes starting to do this. I think he coaches Andy Potts.

The only mishap I had on the ride was going over some railroad tracks and losing another water bottle. I heard it hit the ground and I looked back as it rolled off the road and into a ditch. I stopped and tried to look for it, but it was like looking for a golf ball in the rough. It was amazing that I couldn't find a large 24 oz white water bottle. The ditch ate it up.

Long Bike - 3:02:20 / 95.22 km / 31.3 kph / 129 avg hr / 1956 ft climbing

10

I'd become obsessed if I didn't train for triathlons...

This morning my computer screwed up and I lost 13,000 images that I had on my computer. Yes, 13,000 images, and yes, I did take most of those pictures. Some of the pictures, that I didn't take, go back to when my grandparents were young. Now, normally I'd be freaking, but I have an Apple Time Capsule. A time capsule is Apple's version of a back up system. Today it paid for itself in spades.

It wasn't easy, but over a 6 hour period and four separate calls to Apple, I was finally able to retrieve all the images. As the images were being transferred, I was working on learning more about Internet marketing tools. Before I knew it, it was 7:30 pm, 6 hours just flew by. The kids were laughing, screaming, fooling around and I hardly noticed, I was too focused. Last night was the same, I was doing research on the web and when I looked up it was midnight. I'm normally in bed by 11 pm.

If it was not for triathlons I'd have obsessively worked all night, which is not a good thing. The only thing that pulled me away from my computer was knowing I had to do my swim before the pool closed. As I drove to the pool my mind was racing with all the possibilities of how I can grow our business on the net. The time in the pool went by quickly because I couldn't turn my mind off. I even had a 1:39 for 100 meters because I was so pumped about what I learnt was possible I didn't even feel the pain. Eventually, thankfully, by the end of the swim I was starting to get back to normal.

Many people ask me how I find the time to train so much. After the past couple of days, and as counter intuitive as it sounds, I realize I'd be an obsessive, unbalanced, and an out of shape basket case if I didn't train so much.

Tempo Swim - 1:03:15 / 3000 meters

Back to regular...

I'm feeling great. Monday night I finished the antibiotics and three days later my body is now getting regular, if you know what I mean. I'm also less bloated and starting to feel like my old self again.

I've been part of a medical study for the last four years, my gift to mankind. Today was a half day of cognitive testing, my 4th and last. I never look forward to this day of testing, you'd be surprised how much thinking can exhaust you. Now I just need to do an MRI and I'm done with all the testing. I'm not sure what they're doing with the results, but hopefully it will help others down the road.

I did all my training this evening and for some reason had a spring in my step. Weights first and then a run. My run was going to be the big test for the Garmin. If the heart rate monitor screwed up, I was taking it back and getting a new one. And if I got a new one, I figured I'd sell it new in box and get one of the new Garmin 310's, which is waterproof and the battery is good for 20 hours.

Wouldn't you know it, the heart rate monitor worked perfectly. Dang. Who knows, we'll see if it stays consistent. My run was in the dark and it was a nice 20 C. It's surprising how much faster you go when the temperature is cooler and the sun is not beating down on you. I had one of the best runs I've had in a while. I really really enjoyed it.

Got my first question from eBay on my cycling shoes. A guy from Florida wanted to know if I'd take $50 for my shoes including shipping. He said that's how much he'd pay for used shoes in his area, but would prefer not to pick them up at someones house. I sent him an email back saying "HA, HA, HA" and told him the shoes are worth over $300 CDN and only have 6 hours on them.

I figured he's full of shit saying "he can get it that cheap but didn't want to pick it up at someones house", yah right. He emailed me back and called me an ASS for my HA, HA comment, but he said he's still going to bid on the shoes. Ah, the joy of selling stuff privately. Actually it's a good thing I got new shoes because yesterday I noticed that one of the soles on the old shoes cracked.

Weights - 45:00

Tempo Run - 51:10 / 6.71 miles / 7:32 pace / 140 avg hr

Below is a video that is amazing, it's about the Hoyts. Do not watch if you don't want to get a tear in your eye. They've been doing the Ironman together for over 20 years. It shows the amazing love of a father. Check out their results - the 2:40 marathon blew me away. http://www.teamhoyt.com/races.shtml

No late night banging...

Alyssa's friend Stephanie flew back to Winnipeg yesterday and for the first time in a week the house was quiet at night. The two of them would sleep all morning, go out all evening and stay up all night. We'd go to bed and Alice would have the kitchen sparkling clean, then we'd wake up and it looked like a cyclone hit and furniture would be all over the place.

Alyssa and Stephanie would be making food, Reid would be building stuff, and they all would be making lots of noise, not to mention the television volume was through the roof. It was tough to fall asleep. A couple of times, Alice and I even had to get out of bed to tell them to be quiet, although it didn't help much. It wasn't uncommon for me to hear them banging around at 4 am and we'd wake up about an hour after they went to bed.

My new cycling shoes arrived today, that half size larger made a big difference. They were more comfortable. I put the speedplay pedals on them and was out the door after work for a tempo ride. All around, the bike still just feels great. I can actually now feel myself putting more pressure and power onto the pedals. Before all the adjustments I was spinning more.

I'm also amazed at how much more control I have on the bike. Riding in the areo position feels much more stable, especially on the downhills. I'm not even close to speed wobble territory anymore. Making sharp turns is easier and it feels like I'm climbing hills better . The shoes feel great and I think an adjustment or two on the cleat position should make them even better.

I had a tough time gauging my effort tonight because the Garmin is still not working properly. I'm going to exchange the battery for a second time and if that doesn't work I'm going to take it back and exchange it for a new one. It's frustrating when it doesn't work, especially when my training is based solely on heart rate zones. I don't think I put in the effort I should of because I didn't want to risk going anaerobic.

I ended up doing the eBay thing tonight. I put my cycling shoes, clipless pedals and Zoot runners on eBay. The Zoots were a big decision, but I figured if I can't go sock less without them rubbing on my ankle, they are no good to me. So I'm going to sell them and use the money to buy Newtons.

Tempo Bike - 1:08:04 / 36.87 km / 32.5 kph / 133 avg hr

It's all about the bike, at least tonight...

I'm focused on three things right now. Training, healthy eating and work. I was very proud of myself yesterday because I ate perfectly for the first time in a long time. No junk food, no late night snacking and I was back having protein whey smoothies. Since mid July, I maintained my training routine, but got out of my proper eating and nutrition routine.

I went to the dentist today and he told me I'm healing perfectly. I thought he was going to take the "gos" out of my mouth, it was bothering me and I tried to pull it out and was looking forward to him removing it. He then tells me that it is not "gos" but a "membrane" and that it has to stay in their to help the bone healing process. He said it will dissolve on it's own. Good thing I didn't pull it out.

I did my run this morning and my ride this evening. On my ride my mouth was open, as it always is, and was getting dry. I went to moisten it with my tongue and felt the gum flapped back from the wind. Ewe. For the rest of the ride it was drinking lots of water and trying not to let the wind flap my gums. It was gross.

It was my first ride with the new seat, shoes and bike fit. Right off the bat I could feel that my legs spun better from a better seat height. Then I could tell I was resting more firmly on the aerobars. When I went over bumps, I was more stabilized. I also felt less tension in my upper right back and neck, it was now across my back equally and it reminded me of how I felt last year on my old bike. Which is a good thing. My seat was also much more comfortable. I noticed it the minute I started riding. I still need to test it on a long ride, but my initial thoughts are that it is better.

I still think the shoes are too small and got a call that the new shoes a half size larger have been shipped. I'll spend time riding with both sizes and the right size should hopefully become apparent. I do like the single strap across the shoe, the shoes go on much faster.

I was a little disappointed with the ride. I didn't ride as fast as I normally do and I'm not sure if it was the adjustments to the bike or that I'm just tired. It was a moderate ride but I couldn't keep track of my heart rate because the heart rate feature on my Garmin wasn't working. I got a new battery today and found out after the ride that I needed to sync it back with my watch, so I didn't know how much effort I was putting out. Although I will say, intuitively, I wasn't going hard. I'd be shocked if the average was over 130 bpm.

Mod Run - 1:10:48 / 8.51 miles / 8:19 pace

Mod Bike - 1:46:13 / 54.88 km / 30.9 kph

Weight 182.6 lbs

Is the third time going to be a charm???

For the past month I've felt like I'm losing muscle mass and strength and didn't know why. I've been doing all the same workouts but I've still been feeling soft and weaker, although my racing has been faster. Go figure. Then it dawned on me what had changed. For the past 6 weeks I haven't been taking my protein smoothies everyday. Could that be the cause? I don't know why I stopped, I just broke the habit after we went to Winnipeg.

Needless to say, I started getting back to having my protein drink yesterday and had one this morning. I also decided to try and push more weight during today's weight training session. I was back to grunting through those last few reps. For the first time in a long time my arms and upper body were pumped with a healthy soreness. I was so pumped and sore that I decided to put my swim off until later this evening, just to give my upper body some time to recover.

This afternoon I went to get my bike refit for the third time since February. I specifically asked for Dan at Endrosport this time. He's one of the owners and certified in F.I.S.T. fitting. He did a good job fitting me on my Quintana Roo last year. He said I looked okay as I was but felt there was a few adjustments we could make to help resolve my issues. I told him my right shoulder and groin would get sore after a couple hours of riding, I got calluses on my hands from gripping the front aero bars and my left foot has a stress fracture and it hurts more when I bike than it does when I run.

He put on a new seat, I had him size me with my new shoes and speed play cleats, he put risers on my areo bars, he shortened the stem from 120mm to 110mm with a higher angle, he expanded the distance between the aerobars, adjusted them to be more parallel to the ground, lowered the seat and put my cleats farther back on my shoe. Other than that, he didn't do much, lol.

Immediately I felt that I was resting more on my elbows and wasn't too stretched out, relieving some of the pressure off my shoulder blade and neck area. Then the seat felt more comfortable and I now felt myself sitting properly on my sit bones. My pedal stroke also started to feel more natural. He looked at my new Shimano T-51 shoes, which I thought were too small, but he felt they were the right size. He also thought they may help relieve my foot pain because the carbon soles will better absorb the pressure across the entire foot.

The real test is going to be on my next long weekend ride. I really hope this fixes my problems. He did spend a lot of time with me, at least 90 minutes.

During tonight's swim I still felt sore when I started swimming. Surprisingly I was still able to maintain a fairly good pace and as time went on, I noticed the soreness less. I think it was because of the endorphins masking the pain. I really didn't feel motivated to do my swim tonight and decided to cut my swim a little short, but not before I put in a good 45 minutes.

Weights - 45:00

Swim - 45:05 / 2100 meters

Side effects...

We went to Inglorious Basterds last night, I thought it was a very good movie. The only thing that bothered me was that it brought to life the Nazi era and you see how horrific that period was. Most movies that have brutal killing and make fun of killing are a fictional fantasy world and don't weird you out. Because this was based on a factual event, it felt wrong enjoying the brutality and twisted humor.

Another good nights sleep and a strong training session. I had a little knee pain at the beginning and then it went away. Then I felt some tightness in the Achilles. I think it might be because of the Novamoxin I'm taking. I've also noticed my face is fatter. When I checked out the side effects of the drug, it said that it can cause "puffiness and swelling of the face". I've got one more day of taking these drugs and I'm looking forward to getting off them. No one likes a fat face.

Last night I was playing around with my Garmin and figured out how to download the data. One of the cool features is that it keeps track of elevation. For my long run today I climbed 1784 feet. I'm not sure if that is a lot, but it looks impressive to me. Steelhead had 2200 feet of climbing. I can hardly wait to take it on my next long bike ride to see how much climbing I do.

Long Run - 1:35:34 / 12.01 miles / 7:57 pace / 134 avg hr

7.5

Saturday and no head ache...

Last week was a real lesson. We partied late last Friday and I felt terrible on Saturday. I did my training but it was hard and I didn't enjoy it. Last night was a normal persons night, no high school party. I felt so refreshed this morning and my heart rate was in the low 50's, compared to last weeks high 70's.

The only depressing thing was when I weighed myself this morning and I was up over 4 lbs since Tuesday. How could that be? I've trained a lot and ate fairly well this week. Then I remembered that I'm on antibiotics for my tooth and they can cause water retention.

I can hardly wait until I'm off the antibotics. I've been off and on them since December of last year because of my tooth and I've felt bloated for most of the year. Being on them that long can't be a good thing. Hopefully now that they've pulled the tooth I'll be done with the antibotics soon.

I had a good training session this afternoon. On Wednesday my legs were flat and I struggled on the bike, then two day's later, albeit Friday was a rest day, I had a strong long ride and brick run. I still don't feel comfortable on the bike, my butt and shoulders normally start hurting after two and a half hours.

Monday I've got a new bike fit scheduled and I've ordered a Profile Design Tri-Stryke saddle to be put on before the fitting. I'm really hoping this solves my comfort problem. I have to solve this problem before I start training for next years full Ironman races.

Todays training had a little bit of everything weather. It was cloudy, then it rained, then the sun came out and it got humid. One of the podcasts I was listening to was Zig Ziglar. I haven't listened to him for over 25 years. He's so entertaining, good content, great delivery and on more than one occasion I broke into major laughter as he told stories. If anyone saw me laughing when I rode by they probably thought I had severe mental health issues.

Tonight is going to be fun and I've been looking forward to it all week. Alice, Reid and I are going to Inglorious Bastards. What's cool is that Alice had to buy the tickets earlier today and we're going to have to show up early to get decent seats. There is nothing like the anticipation of waiting to get into an opening weekend movie and experiencing the energy of a crowded theatre.

Long Bike - 3:33:52 / 114.20 km / 32.0 kph

Brick Run - 30:34 / 3.84 miles / 7:58 pace / 143 avg hr

Seven Oaks Place, the start of a wonderful live...

I was up early to catch my flight to Winnipeg for Mrs. Simkins funeral. The flight was delayed a couple hours because the airport was still trying to catch up from last night’s weather delays. Last night there was tornadoes near the airport., which are highly unusual for Toronto.

I arrived by noon and went out for lunch with my parents. I asked them where they took Reid when they were in New York. Reid told me that they really didn’t do much. Turns out that they went everywhere. For example, I’d ask Reid if he went to Central Park and he’d say no. Then my parents tell me they took him on a carriage ride through central park”. Then I’d ask Reid if he went to Wall Street, he’d say “no”. Then I find out he did go to Wall Street.

I can hardly wait until I get home because I downloaded almost 400 pictures that my parents camera. My plan is to go through them with the family and bug Reid about not going anywhere when he was in New York. My dad says Reid remembers things as well as I did when I was a kid.

I have a hate love relationship with funerals. When I was a kid I didn’t like death or funerals, I wouldn’t even go to my Grandma Guarino’s funeral. Funerals just brought on too much emotion. They freaked me out. As I got older, I faced my uneasiness and, reluctantly, would go to a funeral.

I find funerals emotional, even if I wasn’t close to the person who died. When you see family and friends getting up and talking lovingly about that person and recalling the good things they did, it’s touching and in most cases tear jerking.

Now I don’t mind going to funerals and hearing the good things about that person’s life. I find it introspective and it brings out the human side of life. People you may not know well, or co-workers, or business acquaintances become very human when you see them grieving. It puts life in perspective of what’s important and that we are all the same deep down.

When I lived in Winnipeg I used to read the obituaries. Winnipeg is a smaller City with a real sense of community. Everyone knows everyone and virtually everyone who dies has an obituary. Most people in Winnipeg read the obituaries because you never know who may have died that you knew.

When I read those obituaries, I found it interesting because you could tell a lot about a person's life by their obituary. If it was short or non-detailed, they may have lived a simple life, had no family or didn’t have many redeeming qualities. Then there would be others that were very long and detailed, factually written, highlighting a life and career accomplishments. But the ones that touched me the most were the ones that were longer and described a person that was loving and compassionate. Most of the time, this incredible person, would not even have any major career accomplishments.

It didn’t matter if they were male or female, young or old. Some obituaries would just describe the most wonderful person and you could feel the loss felt by those that knew that person. A few times, and Alice could verify this, there would be people I didn’t know, that seemed so remarkable and touched so many people, that I seriously thought about going to their funeral. I never did, but I remember telling Alice that this or that person’s death was tragic and I’d read parts of the obituary to her, most of the time getting choked up.

Mrs. Simkin was one of those wonderful people I’d read about. She was loving and caring and was someone you never forgot after you met her for the first time. One of her grandsons spoke at the funeral and his description of her as a grandmother was the same way I remembered her as a family friend. I'm sure everyone in the synagogue saw her the same way.

It's interesting that the things the grandkids most remembered was the simple things, like sitting around her kitchen table having her homemade chicken soup or her make sure the fridge was filled with each of their favorite foods when they visited. Even though she had physical limitations, she insisted on cooking and serving.

Mr. and Mrs. Simkin were married 63 years and I think were the perfect couple, the spark was still there after 63 years. The grandkids remember the respect and love they had for each other and saw them give each other kisses or loving touches often.

Mrs. Simkin had health issues and had very limited use of her hands, many times I saw Mr. Simkin helping her. He’d help her get dressed and even help her cut her food. On the outside it would look like Mr. Simkin, recognized as a very successful and powerful businessman, was the strong one in the family, but as I got to know the family, I realized that Mrs. Simkin was as strong if not stronger. She was a pillar of strength and love.

I don’t know what it is about a funeral but it makes me reflect on my own life. When I see the lives that Mrs. Simkin has touched so positively, in a simple manner, I wonder if I can better lead my life to do the same.

Reflection Day – Training of the Soul

Pulled myself out of the tail spin...

First thing this morning I got a call from my Dad to tell me that Mrs. Simkin passed away yesterday afternoon. Fan is the wife of Abe Simkin, one of our business partners. She was a beautiful person and I'm sure things must be very tough on Abe and the family right now.

Abe and Fan had to have been married at least 60 years and it's tough to imagine Abe without Fan. They were truly a team, anyone who met them could see right away the love and respect they had for for each other. They epitomized what marriage should be.

When I got to work, the first thing I did was book a flight back to Winnipeg to attend her funeral tomorrow. The flight was leaving today at 6 pm and I needed to get a run in and leave by 4 pm to catch the flight. It was 39 C and all sun when I did my run. I felt like I was running in quick sand. It was a plodding tempo run from the heat and all I was doing was sweating, every piece of clothing on my body was drenched. I couldn't wait to finish so I could cool off. Aside from the heat, the two other things that were bothering me was my left knee and my Garmin.

Periodically throughout the run, my left knee would get a dull pain and then it would go away. I've always been lucky and have never gotten knee pain and I hope this is a one time occurrence. Yesterday I updated the Garmin software and in the beginning of the run was still having problems with the heart rate readings. It seemed to settle down after about 10 minutes, but I'm going to try one other thing and change the battery. If that doesn't work I'm going to exchange it for a new one.

Everything worked out perfectly. I finished the run, had a shower, packed and got to the airport on time. I was actually feeling really good. Last night I had a great sleep and was able to reset physically and mentally. I fully recovered from how I felt yesterday. As I was waiting for my flight it started to rain and then came the thunder and lightening. By this point, no planes at the airport were moving. They were all parked at the gates and no planes were landing. When I looked at the flight schedule, they had delayed my flight by an hour.

I was walking through the airport and heard an announcement that the planes can't depart until the lightening stops or is at least 5 miles away. I looked at the sky, which was black at only 6:30 pm and figured this was going to be a long night. This is the Toronto airport, it is one of the busiest airports in the world. I imagined that once the lightening stopped, which I figured would take at least a couple hours, it would still be a long wait on the tarmac to get through the backlog of departures.

It was a moment of truth. Do I stick it out and wait? Or do I go home and fly out first thing in the morning? I choose the later. I just remember that last week they shut the airport down because of lightening and people had to sleep on floors. At the worst case I didn't want to be one of those people and at the best case I didn't want to get into Winnipeg at 1 am in the morning, a regular sleep schedule is important to me. Plus I'd rather have a guaranteed seat on tomorrow mornings flight rather than fly standby if everything gets backed up.

I think I made the right call because at the time of writing this blog the flight still hadn't departed. There's nothing worse than sitting and waiting in an airport for hours on end.

Tempo Run - 51:09 / 6.25 miles / 8:10 pace / 147 bpm

No soreness, no jam, no shower...

I had a good 8 hours of sleep, but could have used another 3 or 4. Even during the middle of the night, when I get up for my usual bathroom break, I was so tired I walked into the bathroom door frame. I was also tired when I got up and felt tired all day.

I was hoping my morning shower would wake me up but there was no warm water. Because Alyssa and her out of town friend Stephanie have been having showers back to back, they use up all the water. Girls, they are in there forever. The water heater is designed to shut off if there is no water, hence no warm water for me. So I put on my Ironman hat to cover my messy hair and went to work looking like I was going fishing.

Surprisingly I had no sore or exhausted muscles, but I did have tired cloudy head syndrome. Nothing I could do would shake it. I even had an ice cream cone and some candy thinking the sugar rush would snap me awake. No go.

I left work around 4:00 pm. I was baked and wasn't looking forward to my tempo ride tonight. I just didn't have the energy. First thing I did when I got home was take a nap, I didn't even bother eating. When I woke up I felt better and at 7:30 pm decided to give it a try and go for my ride. It was an unusual ride. My goal was to keep my heart rate at the 140 bpm mark and I couldn't get it that high for most of the ride. My legs were so flat, not tired or sore, but flat. I couldn't push enough energy to get the heart rate up. The only time I was able to get it high was going up two king hills, and even then I was going about about 30% slower than I normally do.

During the ride I felt okay, not burnt out or tired, and when I got home I felt fairly normal. It's amazing how exercise can make you feel better. It looks like my Garmin may be working properly again. I called Garmin and they told me I needed to update my software, as the version I have was known to have a bug that created heart rate spikes. But, he said if that doesn't work I should change the battery. I updated the software before I left on the ride and it seemed to work okay. The real test will be on tomorrows run.

Tempo Bike - 1:19:08 / 38.30 km / 29 kph / avg hr 126

A glorious bastard...

I took yesterday off and decided to combine those sessions to today's sessions. Because I was so tired this morning, I couldn't get out of bed early to get in even one session before work. That meant that I'd have to do all my training at lunch time and after work. I couldn't bring myself not to make up yesterdays pool and weight session.

I had to miss last Friday's swim because my tooth was pulled and I needed to get in the water, I was having withdrawls. After an eight day layoff from swimming I noticed I lost lost some speed, about 4 seconds per 100, although I did push the last 100 and did a 1:40.

I also didn't want to miss my weights workout as my upper body feels and looks like it needs it. There was a little drama when I realized I forgot my workout shorts. I had three choices, don't do the weights, do the weights in my wet girlie man swimsuit, or wear my khakis street shorts. I decided to wear the shorts. I was paranoid the entire time because I sweat a lot and was concerned that I'd have a wet stripe running down the backside of my shorts. I just imagined myself having to walk around work with a wet spot. It turns out I was lucky and it didn't happen.

When I got home, I immediately got on the bike for my ride. No waiting, no thought, just a do it now mentality. I was able to finish my bike and avoid the rain. Halfway through the ride I was getting a burnt out fatigued feeling and figured when I got home I'd eat, rest and then run. After I ate I was a little fried and knew the best thing would be to have a nap.

I ended up sleeping for about 90 minutes and would drift in and out of consciousness. When I opened my eyes it was dark out and I had a fleeting moment of wondering if I should do my run workout, it wasn't 100% necessary. Then I snapped myself out of it and told myself that not going is not an option. The only option was whether I was going to go now or a little later. I waited a little and then went.

Tomorrow I'm calling Garmin about my 305. The heart rate monitor doesn't seem to be working. It works well for a while, then starts giving me reading from 150 - 187 bpm when I know I'm no where near that. It's very frustrating because I gauge all my workouts efforts by heart rate. Hopefully it just needs to be reset or something.

Needless to say I'm proud of finishing all my workouts today, which was just under 5 hours of training, on a workday. In a perverse way, I love the long workouts more than the short ones. My body seems to love going long, it's more natural. I must say, all in all, I feel really good. It will be interesting to see how my legs feel tomorrow.

Swim - 1:04:02 / 3000 meters

Weights - 45:00

Mod Bike - 2:05:50 / 62.79 km / 30.1 kph

Mod Run - 1:00:41 / 7.08 miles / 8:34 pace

One big session...

I can't remember the last time I've been in an ALL day meeting. It was with some out of town visitors and was critical. Fortunately, we were productive and were able to get it finished in one day. By the time the day was done, we were all brain dead.

We worked right through lunch and I wasn't able to get my swim or weights in. After the meeting I took my guests out for a beer, which further reduced the available training hours. Then when I got home, Alyssa wanted to use my truck to go to a drive in movie with Stephanie. I could have used Alice's car to get to the pool, but her air conditioning isn't working and I'm too much of a baby to want to drive in 30 C weather without air conditioning. Then I figured it was too late to do my 2 hour ride before dark and eventually I convinced myself to do everything tomorrow. It seems to be a trend of late, combine Mondays training with Tuesdays.

So I ended up hanging around the house and messing with Reid. The house is so much louder and messy since he got back from New York. I played with his head tonight. I took something he was working on off the counter and hid it. He then couldn't find it and started freaking out. He searched the entire house complaining he can't find what he's looking for and then when he left the room, after about 30 minutes of him looking for it, I pulled it out of my hiding place and put it back on the counter. Then he walked by and low and behold it was right back where he had left it and then I played dumb like I don't know how it got there. It drove him crazy. I love harassing him, he deserves it. Then he drives me crazy by eating unhealthy hot dogs and drawing mustaches on his face.

Rest Day

4

Feels great to be done early...

I knew today was going to be hot and I was hoping I'd wake up early and do my long run. I didn't set my alarm clock because I wanted to give my body time to rest as per its internal clock. Low and behold I was up a 7 am and after breakfast, coffee, web surfing and downloading Reid's picture with Mick Foley from my inbox, I was on the road by 8 am. It was already hot. It was 33 C and virtually no wind. Within the first half mile of my run I came up behind a women running and then she stopped. As I passed her she looked exasperated and said "it's to hot to run". I laughed and said "I'm just starting a 2 hour run". I think she thought I was crazy.

It was a beautiful morning run. I didn't see many runners, but I did see a lot of cyclists. The route I take is fairly challenging, lots of hills, although it's well treed which gave me lots of shade. I rarely do my long runs with a water belt, but this morning I'm glad I did. I needed that water and Gatorade. About half way through the run my feet and shoes were soaked from sweat. You don't think about getting wet feet when it's not raining. Next time I hope I remember to bring a change of socks. Wet feet are notorious for causing blisters. I weighed myself when I got home and lost 5 lbs of water on the run.

There was a funny moment when a couple of women went by me on their bikes and we exchanged pleasantries, then about a mile up the road I caught up to them as they were taking a water break in the shade. As I ran by, one of them told me to stop shaming them by catching up to them.

I couldn't believe the amount of women out on their bikes today. I bet you half the cyclists I saw were women. I've noticed that in running races the field is now about half women, whereas years ago there was very few women. Now I'm seeing that women are starting to get more involved in cycling and triathlons. I now know why I see so many women's clothes at the triathlon and running expos.

It sure feels great to be done by 10 am. I've now got the whole day in front of me and I won't have to think about when I should get out the door to do my long run. I also wanted to get the run done early because last week I waited until the evening and had to cut it short due to a huge storm. Had I done it earlier last week I wouldn't have had to cut it short. I guess I'll relax all day and watch Tiger hopefully win his next major.

I've attached a video of Bill Bradley. This guys is an ultra endurance athlete that had a personal crisis in 2006 and got into endurance racing. He's very like able and I follow him on twitter. Enjoy.

Long Run - 1:59:50 / 14.61 miles / 8:12 pace / avg hr 139

Reids back and Stephanie arrived...

It was a late night last night. Alyssa, Alice and I started the night by going to the movie "The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard". For the first 10 minutes it looked like this movie was going to be a winner, then it went downhill and turned out to be a dud. After the movie we hung out at home sitting around had a huge bonfire until 2 am. Technically bonfires are not allowed in our neighborhood, but now that we put up our fence and people can't see the fire, I notched it up a bit. I must say it was also one of my prettiest.

Reid called us from New York yesterday and told us that he met and got his picture taken with Mick Foley, the WWE wrestler. Reid used to be a big WWE fan and his favorite wrestler of all time is Mick Foley. If there is one person in this world that Reid would even care about meeting it would be Mick Foley. He had every action figure and book on Mick Foley and for Christmas one year we even got him a Mankind leather mask. Mankind is one of the characters Mick plays.

Apparently the hotel Reid was staying at had a Continental breakfast and he went downstairs to get some food and bring it back up to the room. As he was standing in line he got bumped into a guy, he looked up, and saw a guy in a suit with a tye dye t-shirt on and then realized it was Mick Foley. Reid said "he couldn't believe his eyes". Reid, all excitedly, put up his hands and asked Mick if he could stay there while he ran back to the room and got his camera. Mick said "sure, no problem". He said "Dad, Mick Foley is really tall in real life and super nice". Reid didn't say it, but knowing him, he probably peed his pants with excitement. Once I get the photo from my parents, I'll post it on the blog. Reid was thrilled, it was the highlight of his trip to New York. Alice and I were really happy for him, that's a life memory.

Last night, sitting around the bonfire, Alice and I were having a great talk. As we always do. The subject of triathlons came up and I was telling Alice how much I've enjoyed getting back into it after the 15 year layoff and how I enjoy the training. Especially long bike rides and runs on the weekends. And that I can't imagine myself stopping, like I did 15 years ago. I couldn't take it mentally.

I was describing the different sensations I feel at different times. Sometimes its a zen like state. Sometimes it tranquil. Sometimes it's the beautiful smell of the trees and plants. Sometimes its the quietness of the morning. Sometimes its the freshness of the morning. Sometimes its the hot and humid weather. Sometimes its the fun training with others. Sometimes its the feeling of accomplishment doing big hills or training with strong winds. As I was describing it I was getting myself worked into a frenzy and if I could have, I would have went for a ride right then and there.

I ended up having a few more beers and one more cigar than I should have, but there was no way I wasn't doing my long ride today. I was still pumped from talking about it last night that wild horse couldn't hold me back. Before I left for the ride, I got an email from Jamie, my Ironman drinking buddy who lives around the corner. He told me he was stumbling around the neighborhood at 2 am, trying to get rid of the "worley birds" from a party he was at and heard my music blasting. He said my "neighbors must love me". I must say, we do have good neighbors. Alice said as the night got later I kept turning the music up, I guess I didn't realize how loud it was.

By the time I got out the door it was 1 pm and hot and semi humid, it was 36 C. I enjoyed the ride. I noticed that there was not a lot of cars or cyclists on the roads today. I guess people were somewhere enjoying the warm weather. I was feeling really strong for most of the ride, but for the last 30 minutes I was starting to fade a bit from last night and my butt was hurting from my seat. I've now got 4500 kilometers on that seat, I think it's time to give up on it and get another one. When I got home, I filled up on lots of water and Gatorade and went out for my brick run and it wasn't easy getting out the door. I forced myself and got rid of all those thoughts that were telling me that I could do the run later.

It was hot. I couldn't believe I was running so fast. For the first mile I was around a 7:44 pace. It was a hard run, I was hurting. It was the first training run I almost started walking because I was starting to get too fatigued. I kept telling myself that it was my own fault for staying up too late and abusing my body and now I needed to man up and finish with dignity. With one mile to go, I had to stop and turn off the podcast I was listening to and put on some inspiring music. It helped. Once I got going again, I kept going. The only downside was that there was no way I could keep the heart rate low, it was in the red zone the entire time.

When I finished, Alice was home from picking up Reid at the Airport and Alyssa's friend Stephanie had arrived from Winnipeg, they all saw my pain. I had sweat pouring out of my entire body and it took about 30 minutes in a well air conditioned house before I stopped sweating. Alice kept running behind me with a towel wiping up sweat from the floor, the chair, the table, the countertop and any thing else I touched. I was out of it and couldn't pick up a towel to wipe up the sweat if my life depended on it. All I was doing was drinking water and Gatorade and trying to keep it together. This was definitely a character building training day that I'll use if I'm feeling badly during an Ironman.

I was actually a little upset that I had too much fun last night because it dampened the enjoyment of today's training. It would have been so much more fun if I wasn't hurting from last night. I know this sounds strange coming from me, but I was actually even thinking about quitting drinking because its wrecking my workout enjoyment.

Long Bike - 3:02:48 / 96.2 km / 31.6 kph

Brick Run - 30:01 / 3.7 miles / 8:07 pace / 152 avg hr

One less tooth...

This morning I got my tooth pulled and some bone added to my jaw. Finally. It has been infected since last November after I had a root canal and a crown put on it. They tried lots of different antibiotics but nothing helped and because nothing helped, the bacteria was eating away at the bone. Yuck.

They gave me some drugs to sedate me and I took them an hour before. The only problem is that they didn't work. They told me the drugs were quite strong and that I'd probably not remember the day and I had to have to get a ride to and from the dentists office. Cool. I was looking forward to being so drugged up I couldn't remember the day, nothing like a new sensation.

Unfortunately, I didn't feel anything, not even a little tiredness and ended up driving myself to the office. I did bring Alice for the return trip just in case. When I got to the office, the assistant was a little surprised that I wasn't tired. I guess they see people all floppy and stuff. Not me. I told her that I have a high threshold, maybe from the amount of beer I can drink or doing Ironmans. In either event, nothing really happened, I remembered everything and even felt the pain of those big needles they use. I was gripping the chair when he gave me those needles. At that point I was wishing the drugs had worked.

He even had to add more freezing after he got started because the first few blasts weren't enough. The only effects of the drugs was that I had a good nap when I got home. I woke up by jumping up and thinking I overslept and missed my dentist appointment. It gave Alice a good laugh when I jumped up and said "where am I, I think I have something to do, shit I missed my dentist appointment" and then she said I went already. Then I had a laugh and was totally back to normal. I even did a little work and prepared an agenda for a meeting on Monday.

Around 5 pm I was looking at one of my twitter account entries and it said, and I quote, " Just got back from dentist. it wa a success and i feel stoned from the drugs. I'm on brain mush" and it was sent from a piece of software I don't use often. I thought someone used my account, but how would they know I was at the dentist? Then I asked Alice if I was on the computer and she said yes. She then told me that when she saw me on the computer and she thought it was best that I lie down and fall asleep, which she told me to do, and apparently I did. I guess the drugs did kick in because I have no recollection of being on the computer and sending that tweet.

Rest and Recovery Day.

18

Why did the chicken cross the road...

Good news. With the help of Maryka Sennema, I found out that I'm going to be in the 45 -49 age group next year, even though I'll only be 44 years old. I'll explain later. Maryka is a kick ass triathlete. This year she won the 35 -39 women's age group in Lake Placid with a blistering 10:41:52 and she even had problems that slowed her down along the way. Check the race report on her blog, I enjoyed it.

If you've ever read Malcom Gladwells New York best selling book, the "Outliers", you would have read that 92% of all professional hockey players and almost all the professional soccer players in the world are born between January and March. Chances are if your not born in one of those three months you'll never become a professional hockey or soccer player.

The reason is that the cutoff date to determine ages for the divisions is January 1st. Therefore, kids born closest to January 1st tend to be bigger, stronger, more mature than kids born closer to December 31st. As a kid, a 6 month difference in age makes a huge difference. January to March born kids typically get chosen for the elite teams and get the advantage of elite development, whereas the September to December kids rarely get chosen for elite development.

Why am I explaining this? Because the opposite is true for triathletes over 40 years old. A Triathletes appropriate age group, or division, is based on how old they are on December 31st of the year they are racing. For example, I'm turning 44 in this November and for all my triathlon races next year I will be 44 years old. But because on December 31st of next year I'll be 45 years old, I'm automatically put in the 45-49 year old age group, even though I'm only 44 year old. The benefit is that I'll be one of the youngest triathletes in my division and hopefully that age advantage will give me a speed advantage. At least that's the theory.

The Ironman qualifying times for the 45-49 age group are typically slower than the 40 - 44 age group and by being in the 45 - 49 year age group I'll have a better chance of qualifying for Kona than if I was in the 40-44 age group. It's the first time being a November born baby has paid off. Based on last years Ironman Lake Placid qualifying times for the 45-49 age group, if I had the race of my life, I could potentially qualify. If I did China, based on last years qualifiers times, I'd just need to have a good race to qualify. That's got me pumped and motivated. I really want to return to Kona with the family.

Training today was fairly uneventful, except for the chickens and the time travel. I was doing a tempo ride and I had to do a double take. There was three chickens in the middle of the road, it was like I was a third world Country. They weren't afraid of me and didn't move when I rode through them. Which is a good thing, I was worried one of them might panic and jump into my spokes. It was also the first hot weather evening ride of the year, it was over 30 C and humid, which made it feel like 36 C. Last year I had a LOT of my rides in this type of whether and I love riding in hot humid weather, it feels like the air is giving you a hug. Today's weather made it feel like I had time travelled back to last year.

Weights - 45:00

Tempo Bike - 1:03:38 / 33.87 km / 32.0 kph

1

You know your getting old when...

How one day makes a difference. Yesterday I did three training sessions and felt great. This morning I woke up and my legs and butt was sore from starting up the weight training again, primarily the lunges. Oh how I hate the lunges. It just shows that no matter how good of shape your in, if you don't use it, you loose it. I've always said I enjoy the soreness feeling I get from starting and new program, but now it's getting old. I'd much more prefer to keep doing weights all year long and not get the soreness feeling. But year round weights is not part of the training program, unfortunately.

I had physiotherapy this morning and told the therapists that since I've been coming, it seems that my foot is getting worse. Before I started treatment, I noticed it less and now I'm noticing it more. They were truly concerned and were at a loss. Normally a few sessions of laser therapy brings results. One of the therapists who I hadn't worked with, took a look at my foot and we both agreed that I have a bio-mechanical issue. It's apparent. When you look at my left foot, the ball of the foot area looks different than the right, it protrudes out a little. We both agreed that the only way it is going to heal is with rest, and I won't be able to rest until after November 14th. I'm going to the fracture clinic on Monday for a follow up visit and I'm curious to see what the doctor has to say.

Right now I'm in major learning mode. My business is transforming itself from a traditional printing business to an online marketing business and I'm immersing myself in all things Internet. All I'm doing is trying to learn about Internet based marketing. Whenever I train now, I listen to podcasts and at work I'm learning online. It's a very exciting time and I'm putting the same level of effort into it that I put into triathlons. I think it's so cool that technology allows me to train and learn at the same time. It's like I'm adding more than 24 hours to my day.

It was hard to get motivated to run tonight because my butt muscles were so sore and I knew it wasn't going to be a painless tempo run. Before I left, Alice and I got in a discussion trying to figure out how old we were. Were we 43 or 44 years old. We even had to start doing math. It turns out I'm turning 44 years old in November. Which I think keeps me in the 40 - 44 year old category for one more year. Which is a bummer because it would be easier to qualify for the Hawaiian Ironman if I was in the 45-49 age group. Maryka Sennema gave me some good suggestions regarding my goals and plans for next year and it looked like it may have worked based on the qualifying times for the 45-49 age group, but for the 40-44 age group it's may not. If I'm wrong on the age group, please leave me a comment.

Also, I found this triathlon race time prediction calculator. It's pretty cool and useful. http://www.triathloncalculators.com/#

Tempo Run - 51:59 / 6.83 miles / 7:37 pace / 143 avg hr

Star Wars on the road...

I didn't want to get out of bed early this morning, but I knew I had too. If I didn't, I wouldn't be able to fit in all my training and I had a missed weights session I needed to make up from yesterday. I'm glad I did, it was a beautiful morning.

Once I get running, I get into the zone and the time flys by, especially now since I've started listening to podcasts. Either my heart rate monitor wasn't working right or I had heart palpitations. It would go from 130 bpm to 157 bpm and back down. I think it was the technology because for the last two miles of the run it stayed around 130 bpm.

I managed to get my weight training done at lunch time. It was the first time I realized I had a little more weight around the midsection and that it's got to go. The mirrors don't lie. I guess I shouldn't have had that McDonalds McFlurry last night. But I'm not too worried, it took me a month to put it on and it won't take me more than a month to take it off. It's probably only about 5 lbs.

I was motivated to ride when I got home from work but then it started raining and I didn't want to ride in the rain. Instead, I ate and had a nap, I figured I'd be riding tomorrow. When I woke up the skies were clear and I was still debating if I should ride, it was getting late. Then I got a shot of motivation by eating some popcorn twists. After I ate them I figured I better get on the bike and burn them off, which I did. I didn't get out of the house until 8:15 pm and didn't realize that it's starting to get dark around 9 pm. Forty minutes into the ride I had to stop and take out the removable shades from my sunglasses because it was so dark out. Luckily I was able to still ride with the prescription inserts, if not, it would have been a scary ride not being able to see anything.

For the last 30 minutes I rode in complete darkness. It was so dark that when a car would come in the opposite direction, they would blind me with their headlights and I couldn't see where the side of the road was. One time it was so bad I had to stop until the car passed. I wasn't so worried about cars coming from behind because I was wearing a high powered flashing red light that can be seen from a mile away. Also, all the critters were coming out and I big old raccoon was sitting at the side of the road looking at me as I passed. I was just hoping I wouldn't run into one of his cousins on a downhill. The coolest part of the ride was the lightening bugs. I could see them all over the place and on one downhill they were coming at me and I felt like I was in the movie "Star Wars". It was worth riding in the dark just to experience that sensation.

Mod Run - 1:11:40 / 8.55 miles / 8:22 pace / 137 hr.

Weights - 45 min

Mod Bike - 1:43:48 / 52.64 km / 30.3 kph

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The house just got a whole lot quieter and cleaner...

Last night the rains were torrential and I was lucky to get home just before it started to pour. It turned out that it was one of the worst storms in a long while. On the news they said that there was over 4600 lightening strikes. The power got knocked out all over and even at the airport. Many of the airport hotels were without power. Some of the people in the hotels slept in their cars with the motor running and the air conditioning on because it was too hot in the hotel. I didn't realize how lucky I was that I decided to cut the run short and head home. Rarely do I cut a workout short, if I do, I feel guilty. But this time it felt justified.

This morning I got a call from my Mom. Her and my Dad were supposed to be flying into Toronto, arriving at noon today. The plan was for Reid to join up with them and they were going to continue on to New York for the week. My parents have started a tradition of taking each of the grandchildren to New York when they become teenagers and Reid's going to be 13 years old in November. Because of last nights weather, the flights were so backed up that they had to take a later flight and weren't getting in until 8 pm.

I got back to my routine and went for a swim at lunch time. As I was putting my goggles on, the strap broke. I was standing on the edge of the pool and I didn't want to miss my swim. So I tied the straps together which made the goggles fit very tight to my face. In between sets I took them off to try and relieve the pressure from my eye sockets. It was a great swim. It was one of those swims where the time went by quickly and it was enjoyable from beginning to end. I needed that swim. The cool water felt great.

My parents finally arrived this evening and Alice and I drove Reid to the airport. He's staying the night in a hotel with them and they'll be flying to New York at 6:30 am. When they get there, his cousin Ryan, who's 15 years old, will be flying in from Florida to join them. Ryan and Reid have a similar sense of humor and could pass as brothers. It's both of theirs first time in New York. They should have fun and I'm sure there will be a lot of laughing between the two of them. I hope they don't drive my parents too crazy.

When we dropped Reid off at the hotel, my parents wanted to show us their room, but wouldn't say why. When we saw it, it was unique in that it had two double beds back to back and sitting in the middle of the room, very euro sheik and odd looking. It actually wasn't a bad idea considering each bed has it's own TV, although it was a little awkward to walk around the room.

Long Swim - 1:03: 26 / 3000 meters

Fueled by Pizza and beer...

I had an 11 hour sleep and spent the entire afternoon sitting on the deck, sipping on beers and twittering. For dinner I ordered a pizza, from my computer of course. By 8 pm I figured I better get out for my long run. All day it was hot and humid and normally I love running in this sort of weather, but with this being a recovery week I decided to wait until the early evening.

Nothing motivates you to run than after drinking beer and eating pizza. You have to do something to burn those calories. I'm lucky in that I have an "iron" stomach. I can eat and drink anything and then go for a run right after. The only time I had a problem was about 20 years ago when I ate an entire large Domino's pizza all by myself and went for a run. I was fine until I ran by Domino's and could smell the pizza cooking and on my full pizza stomach I almost lost it. But my "iron" stomach came through and I didn't.

It was a strange run. When I left it was hot, humid and muggy outside. Just how I like it. Then about 20 minutes into the run I could see in the horizon a large dark storm cloud. From a distance it had lots of lightening coming from it and it was coming my way. As it got closer it got blacker, it got windy and the air became very cool. The heat and humidity was gone in less than 30 seconds. I planned on doing an hour and thirty five minutes but because it was a recovery week and there was heavy lightening I decided to turn and run towards home.

This is the weird part. The lightening was the worst I've ever seen. At one point it went off and blinded me, the entire sky went white and knocked out the street lights. I was running by a house at that time and some people on there deck even made the "woe" sound. As I ran the side walk was wet, the rain had come down before me. As I ran the rain was either in front of me, behind me or beside me at any given moment. It was strange. It was raining everywhere but on me. It stayed like this until I got to my front door step and then it started coming down everywhere. About 20 minutes later it became torrential and the power in the house was knocked out a couple of times.

Mod Run - 49:58 / 5.91 miles / 8:27 pace / avg hr 136

6

Nothing like a 4 hour recovery ride...

The alarm when off at 6:15 am and I hit the snooze button 3 -4 times, I can't remember. I didn't want to get out of bed. I had a sore head from staying up late last night and having one to many beers, and the 3 cigars didn't help. I was to meet Mark Rutledge at 7:40 am at a designated cross road in the Escapement, which was a 25 minute ride away. I didn't have to go, I could have jammed out and stayed in bed, but I didn't. I got up, ate, got ready and was out the door.

It was a beautiful, cool, morning. I met up with Mark and he brought Walt with him. Walt is also an Ironman triathlete, who did a blistering 10:05 at Lake Placid a couple of years ago in the 35-39 age group. Last year I met and did a ride with Walt and a group of Mark's friend. This year Walt's taking it easy and not really doing any long races. Mark was doing a 180 km today and is training for Ironman Canada at the end of the month. This morning we looked team Cervelo with our bikes. After a couple of hours Walt left us and then after 3.5 hours I left Mark, strategically just before a big hill.

My legs were flat and at times, especially on the hills, my heart rate went into the red zone to keep up with them. This was the first long ride I used my new Shimano cycling shoes and clipless pedals. Turns out that the shoes are too tight. What I didn't anticipate was my feet swelling on longer rides. I also started to get knee trouble from the clipless pedals.

Mark noticed an imbalance and we stopped and he helped adjust the shoe. I was a little better after that, but I've decided to go back to my speedplays. I'm going to see if I can get a larger pair of cycling shoes and I'll sell the ones I have on ebay, they've only been used 5 hours. I may also sell the clipless pedals and use the money to buy another set of speedplays. Since I'm at it, I'm going to sell my Zoots running shoes, after just one run. The idea behind the Zoots is that you can wear them sockless for faster transition times. When I tried them sockless they rubbed on the back of my foot and caused bleeding. Not something I want to deal with during a race.

I'm now wondering if I ever even needed to get the Zoots or the Shimanos. The reason I got them was because I wanted to reduce my transition times. Now that I think about it, I'm doing Ironman and Half Ironman distance races. The extra time to put on socks and fasten three straps instead of one is not a big deal in the whole scheme of things. Comfort is much more important than speed in those race distances. Live and learn.

Today's ride was fairly uneventful. It was hard doing the backside of Appleby hill and going downhill I was able to get over 77 kph with no speed wobble. Along the way we met a rider named Fransico, who moved here from Columbia and just finished his first ever triathlon at Lake Placid this year. We exchanged contact information and now I have another potential long ride partner. After a couple of hours Walt left and then after 3.5 hours I left Mark, strategically just before a big hill.

For what was supposed to be an easy 2.5 hour recovery ride, it turned into a 4 hour ride. I was thinking I might do 180 km, but I was fading and my knee was sore. I'm looking forward to another bike fitting. I noticed that I'm getting callouses on the palms of my hands. I know what your thinking and no it's not from that, it's from the aero bars. I think I'm leaning to far forward and pushing my palms hard against the bars, and they rub when as I go over the bumps on the road. When I got home I was feeling like I was going to bonk, I had forgot a couple of my powerbars at home before I left, and my head was sore from last night. After an Advil and some food, I started feeling better and after a nap, still wearing my cycling clothes, I woke up feeling back to normal.

Long Bike - 4:05:03 / 120 km / 29.3 kph / 131 avg hr

4.5

Caught up, finally...

I had a good day, I got caught up with all my work and I left early with a clean desk. I was on my way to the pool at lunch time but halfway there I decided not to do the swim. My wrist was sore from the last swim, I guess my arms were stronger than my wrists. The next two weeks are to be easy workouts before I start my Clearwater training program.

It was a nice day, finally, and a nice night. Alice and I hung out on the deck and Jamie and Barb came by for a while. It was a bit of a late night and just on the verge of going over the edge, which would make my ride tomorrow really hard. We got to bed around 1:30 am, which was a little too late. I've got a ride scheduled with Mark Rutledge tomorrow and have to be up at 6:15 am.

Recovery Day - No training

13

Training plan in place...

Monday was a holiday and my internal clock is all screwed up. This morning I woke up and thought it was Wednesday. As I was lying in bed and just turned on the TV, I was thinking about my sore foot. Then it dawned on me that it was Thursday and I had a physiotherapy appointment in 15 minutes. There was no time to shave or shower and I was out the door. I got there right on time. I met Nicole, another triathlete who was getting treatment. She was in rough shape and hadn't been able to do any racing this year because of her knees. By the time I was done, I had no time to shave and shower. For the first time, other than a Saturday, I showed up at work wearing a tee shirt, flip flops, running hat, shorts and unshaven. I normally where the tee shirt, shorts and flip flops, but I normally shave and don't wear a hat. One of the guys asked if I was hungover.

I finalized my training plan for the World Championships. It feels good to get it all on paper, now I don't have to think, I just have to do. I actually feel like I'm starting a new season. This week is a recovery week and I'm having fun. Then starting this weekend I'll get back at it. I did a recovery run tonight and I was slow. I could feel all the muscles in my calves and hamstrings pulling and stretching. Not only from the race, but I think I'm a little dehydrated. As I was running, I was listening to a podcast interviewing Craig Alexander, last years Hawaiian Ironman Champion. It was interesting because everything he goes through in terms of race preparation and racing is the same thing us age groupers go through. The only difference is that he has more natural ability and more time to train. He even says he has trouble at times pushing himself out the door to train and that triathlons is as mental as it is physical. He's a good interview, seems like a nice guy.

Recovery Run - 59:34 / 6.80 miles / 8:45 / avg hr 132

There's another reason I train...

These past two days I've been busy at work. Today, from the minute I got in until I left I was busy. I didn't even have time to go grab some lunch, Kevin at work was going out and I had him pick me something up. By the time I left work, I was tense and a little wired. I ate and tried to nap it off, but that only worked for a while. As the night went on I could feel my back tightening again. I decided I had to go for a swim, I needed to do something to relax my mind. Before I left I decided to look in my swim bag to make sure I had everything. Then I discovered I didn't have my goggles and the tension in my back grew. I took them to Michigan and they got misplaced, I was starting to freak. Thank goodness for Alice, she found them.

I was trying to relax on the way to the pool. When I got there I looked at the pool through the window and was looking forward to getting in the water and swimming. I had a very enjoyable and surprisingly fast swim. It felt great. When I got out of the pool I was much more relaxed. I had went from a 9 on the tension scale to about a 2. When I opened my locker I realized I forgot my towel. The irony was that I brought two towels and left them in the truck, but because I was much more relaxed, I laughed it off and left the Y with soaking wet hair.

When I got home I was a new person. It was then I realized that I NEED to train. It keeps me balanced. Up until last month, I went two years without a bad back and I believe it was a direct result of exercise. In only a 2000 meter swim I transformed my state of mind and released the tension from my back. I even noticed that my neck was loosening up and I was hearing some cracks. I love when I hear my bones cracking, it means my body's loose.

I just revised my Steelhead Ironman 70.3 video with pictures I just got from the race. They arrived today. Alyssa looked at the picture of me holding my qualifying letter and said she has never seen me have such a big smile, EVER.

Mod Swim - 38:42 / 2000 meters