Reid Goes Old School...

I did it!!! I finally got Reid to commit to doing a triathlon. It wasn't easy, it took months, but he wants a cell phone so bad he agreed to do one.

For the past month or two, all he's been asking for is a cell phone and I kept telling him I'd get him one if he did a triathlon. He'd then say, "It's not fair, you never made Alyssa do a triathlon in order to get her cell phone".

Then I'd get into the, "Your not Alyssa, you need to worry about yourself and not others".

I'd then say, "Robert wouldn't have a problem with the bet" and he'd say, "Fine then, I don't want a cell phone" and I'd say "Fine, cause you ain't getting one unless you do a triathlon".

At this point, Alice would usually jump in and say, "I'm sick of all these bets, why does everything have to be a bet?" I'd then reply with the king of all retorts and say, "because".

(Before I continue, I want to explain who "Robert" is, I don't think I've ever told the story of "Robert". Robert is the name I recently gave the miscarriage Alice had. I remember telling Reid that he wouldn't be born if Robert lived, that we were quitting at two and he was lucky Robert got flushed down the toilet. Alice then told me that the toilet had nothing to do with it, that she went to the hospital).

Today was a major turning point. Reid was talking about bike riding and I asked him if he wanted to try my Trek. He said "sure". When Reid says "sure" in a nonchalant way, I've come to learn it means, "F#cken A".

The only problem with my Trek is it doesn't have pedals. Then I realized, hey, what about my 1986 Centurion. It has the old style "rat trap pedals". I asked Reid if he wanted to try the Centurion and he said, "sure".

I pulled the bike out of the crawl space in the basement, pumped up the tires, lowered the seat and in no time Reid was riding. He was a little nervous at first and rode the sidewalk and wasn't sure about how to use the gears. It didn't take long and he was riding pretty good.

He was surprised how fast the bike went. I asked him if he wanted me to get my bike and go for a ride with him? He said, "sure". We started riding and got up to a high of 27 kph. I told him he was doing great, that "27 kph is how fast John Barclay does the Ironman". Reid seemed proud of himself.

We did a couple of kilometers around the house and when we got back he asked, "How far is 10 km?" I knew why he was asking, it's the biking distance of the kids triathlon I was trying to get him to do. I said, "do you want me to show you how far 5 km is?" He said "sure".

The ride ended up being 4.3 km and we averaged 20 kph. He kept asking me "if MY back was sore?". His was. When we got back in the house, he kept asking me questions about the kids triathlon. He was asking, "How long is the swim again? How long is the run? How much time would it take to finish the swim? Is the swim in a pool? How much time would it take to finish the run?"

I told him "It'll take you about an hour total". Then he started asking me questions like, "okay, if I do this, I get a cell phone right?" I could tell he was warming up to the idea of doing it. He was a little nervous about the open water swim and I said, "I'll go with you to do some open water swimming and I'll take you on some hills in the escarpment".

That's all it took, he finally agreed to do it and we shook hands and made "the cell phone bet". The race is the Barrie Triathlon on August 8th. It's a 350 meter swim, a 10 km bike and a 3 km run.

They also have an Adult sprint an hour after the kids start. I decided not to do it, I don't want to miss watching him "suffer and finish". Years ago, I raced when Alyssa did her one and only triathlon and I later regretted not being able to watch it from start to finish.

I'm glad Reid decided to do it. He's in the best shape of his life right now. He now running 40 minutes, 3 times a week. He's swimming 4 times a week. He's doing weights 3 days a week AND he's riding his bike for no reason on a regular basis. There's no better time for him to do a triathlon. He'll also be able to put it in his Renaissance Man knapsack.

On the training front, I had a great bike ride today. I felt very strong and no matter how hard I pushed, I couldn't get my heart rate over 140 bpm. There was some hills that I'm used to climbing at 19 kph and today I was climbing them at 30 kph effortlessly.

I resisted pushing too hard as I'm now in my taper phase and I didn't want to beat up my legs. I will say, "This was the best bike ride I've had since February in Palm Springs, it felt so damn good and enjoyable. I didn't ride in the small front chain ring once".

My diet is also going reasonably well. I do great until the evening and it seems I can't resist one indulgence. Yesterday it was movie popcorn. Tonight it was about 5 small chocolate ice cream cones. But other than that, I ate like a rabbit all day.

I definitely noticed that since I started eating small, controlled portions, my heart rate has dropped like a stone. Starting tomorrow morning I'm going to weigh myself daily until IMLP. I need the motivation of seeing that scale go down, or up.

Mod Bike - 2:24:08 / 79.02 km / 32.89 kph / 120 avg hr