I'll just take the metric version

This may become a new trend. Whatever distance Jeremy does in his Ironman training, I'll do kilometers to his miles! I think it'll work perfectly. 

This past Saturday was the 10th annual Tour de Ruidoso, which hosted a 100 miler and a 100K. This is the city up on our "big" mountain (I know I keep calling it that, but it does go up to 11,000ft, which is over 1000 higher than the one just up the road from us). So we trekked up to the cooler weather, where I decided at the last minute to shed the arm warmers. The sun was coming up and standing at the car felt warm. I regretted this decision for about 2 miles. I told Jeremy to get up there with the front group when we started, and realized that I was so concerned about him that I forgot to position myself accordingly. I know I'm slower lately, but I should still beat some of the mountain bikes and guys in cotton t-shirts. Plus it would be nice to have somebody to draft off of. The first 2 miles I worked by myself up a little incline, trying to catch the pack that had formed in front that Jeremy had gotten onto in time. Not wanting to go out too hard, but not wanting to ride completely by myself, it was a tough decision, but I kept pushing. THEN, we made a turn onto the highway which went straight uphill. 

Ah ha, it was the beginning of what had been described on the registration form! 

Beginning with a climb from 6840 to 7485, a downhill and a climb back to 7482 and then dropping down to 7257 ... and this is in the first 6 miles!

Of course after the hills started, everyone spread out and the usual happened. I would make up ground on the uphills, people would fly by me on the downhills. I was being particularly careful with my downhill speed due to this whole pregnancy thing-- I really don't want to fall-- so I was getting left behind. Every so often the road would flatten a bit and I would ride with a few others, or a small group. There were several groups of Mexican cycling teams, and I think they particularly appreciated my Los Locos kit. I got at least one chuckle. 

I rode in a nice little paceline for a few miles with about 4 men. One was of the t-shirt wearing type, and he was all over the road. You know those people who can't be still to save their lives? He was fidgeting all over the bike. I think he burned three times as many calories as I did per pound. After each person had had their turn behind him, someone finally broke away off the front and let him scare the next group for a while. 

Losing those guys somewhere between the braking on the downhills and passing on the uphills, I found myself mostly alone again, until a few hills later when I passed a guy in white. Some people don't say a word in passing (especially when being passed on an uphill by a girl), but Juan Carlos was not one of those people! We started chatting from the moment I pulled up beside him, and he had a lot of encouragement to give. It turns out my new friend is a former pro cyclist from Columbia. He says he was much smaller back in the 80s when he was racing (he weighed about the same as I do now), but still, I kept up with a Columbian pro! He let me go on one of the climbs, and I said I'd see him later. 

I knew we were getting close to the airport, with one more hill to go. As I crested one and made a turn, a lone crow the size of a bear cub, cawed at me as I passed. I could tell exactly when Juan Carlos and another guy passed. I think he was cheering us on. 

So back to this flat section that I'd been looking forward to. The straight on headwind that we turned into made my speed much slower than I'd expected. The most brutal part was that I could see several miles ahead of me, and I knew that it wasn't ending anytime soon. I later described this "flat section by the airport" as the worst one for me. I was told it "wasn't exactly flat." 

Garmin tells me they were right: 

As a side note, this reminds me of how mean I am. There's a section on our "flat ride" from home that I always get onto Jeremy for going so slow on. I had in it my head that he had it in his head that it was actually an uphill when it was clearly not.

 

Again, Garmin was there to settle it: 

 

Yes, I'm mean. Or just really bad at judging grade. But back to the ride. I did take a break at the final rest stop for a delicious PB&J, and I figured it might be a long time getting home. As soon as I saddled back up I saw Juan Carlos up the road just a bit and hoped to catch him for a nice draft. About 5 miles later, I finally got within his view, and I think he slowed down for me. And he left me draft! But it ended quickly as we got to "the final downhill." A very nice volunteer lady cheered us on and told us it was all downhill. This being JC's specialty these days with the extra weight, he took off. But around the corner we found that the nice lady lied. Twice. My Garmin had called it quits for the day at about 54 miles, and left me by myself for those last few hundred feet up and thankfully down as well.

Finally finished, with nothing to do but eat green chile burgers and wait for Jeremy, but not drink the free beer, I found some good people to chat with, I won a recycled bike chain bottle opener (to match my recycled bike chain picture frame), and even saw some football. 

I'll let Jeremy describe his long, flat tiring (haha) day with a few more thousand feet of climbing thrown in there. But I want to remind everybody that he only carried himself over that course, while I was biking for two. :)

P.S. Does anyone else have a 405 that only holds a 100% charge for 3 hours??

Smells Like Ironman Season

I really love this time of year. It's Ironman season! I love the excitement surrounding Ironmans and the last few weeks of training and taper when you either know you have this one nailed, or the nervousness is setting in about the weather, the heat, your bike being in the shop, or your tendinitis acting up. 

So far the season is well under way, with IM Coeur d'Alene, Lake Placid, Louisville, Canada, Wisconsin, and Wales over. First timers like Keith had solid first races and got hooked, and veterans like Damie overcame tough conditions to finish with a great race. I've personally only done 2 IMs earlier than October, so I feel like we've still got a lot of excitement coming. 

Around these parts it's quite different from what I'm used to. Normally it's me, just me, leaving piles of dirty laundry and water bottles everywhere. I'd scrounge for my own meals in the late evening after a long mid-week brick. But not this year. I've never had a husband train for an Ironman before (or even a IM-training roommate for that matter), and while I'm not giving him his specific training plan, I still feel somewhat responsible for how he races on Nov 20th. I want him to succeed almost as much as I always wanted to, but it's mostly out of my control. That's a weird feeling! I think some of my own "I didn't do a far/ fast/ hard/ windy enough swim/ bike/ run" guilt feelings have been rubbing off on him. It could be for the better, but I know I can be particularly OCD about that, and I hope it doesn't affect him negatively.

My responsibility should be providing nutritious, delicious foods for him, washing 3 loads of laundry a day, moving all 12 water bottles from sink to dishwasher daily, and possibly doing yardwork and extra cleaning for him (ooops, he just mowed the grass; maybe next week). I keep putting that stuff off until 1) my job ends in 2 weeks, 2) my appetite returns from the land of morning sickness purgatory, and/or 3) I figure out which of his athletic clothing actually goes in the dryer (I'm sure I'll shrink something to cut-off 80s tank length). 

He's really being a good Ironman athlete so far. He's not complaining too much; only rarely does he admit to tiredness. Despite my heightened olfactory senses, he really almost never smells after working out (I need to start using his deodorant more often). Since I'm only doing partial rides and runs with him, he lets me sleep in most weekends and picks me up for the second loop. He hasn't complained that I rarely cook these days; he doesn't mind the occasional Sonic or Taco Bell run (ok, yes it's more than occasional). 

I do need to work on my spectating endurance, since I know an all day Ironman spectathlon is a tiring, energy consuming event. Last weekend I practiced with a half, but it honestly seemed to fly by. I was ready for it. Double the distance will take some work, but I look forward to having friends there to sherpa me through it. Luckily I have 9 more weeks of training.

And now to leave you with our featured Ironman athlete, finishing off his last race with a bang head-first slide.

Immediately from stepping over the finish line, to a full speed dive onto this:

 

Don't let that Garmin get submerged in the...! oh, well, that's ok, it'll dry.

 

The open trails

I had the afternoon off yesterday (have to take all my vacation time before the job ends this month), so I left town at a few degrees over 100 and intensely sunny and headed up a few thousand feet to the trailhead at the top of the mountain. It was drizzling rain and my car reported that the outside temp was 55. In degrees Farenheit. I waited a few minutes until the rain slacked off and headed out to the trails. It definitely didn't feel 55 degrees cool, but it was such a relief to shed the sweaty clothes and breathe a few breaths of moist cool air. 

I went to the Trestle trail where I'd been once before with Mom and Dad last fall, but wasn't sure where I'd go after. I hadn't really explored the area, but ended up finding intersection after intersection, all well marked and pointing me to familiar places. 

I had forgotten my trail shoes and foot calluses, as it has been several months since I've done any trail running up there (the forest has been closed!), and wound up with a few blisters, but it was so worth it. I kept finding myself just smiling about being out there on the trails. I'm sure the few others out there hiking thought I was a bit psycho, but then again, maybe they understood. I kept marveling at the smell of trees. There are mostly pines up in that area, with a few aspens thrown in for fall color, and I couldn't get enough of the smell. I just wanted to bottle up the air and bring it back down. 

I didn't carry any animal repellent this time, since I was staying so close to the highway, but I did get to see a tiny snake and what I am positive was bear poop. I almost took a picture of the poop, but instead just stood there trying to figure out what it had eaten instead. I'm not a poopaphile, I just like knowing what lives on those trails besides deer (which make themselves very known). 

Apparently I went down down down many hundred feet at the beginning of the run (I have sore glute meds to prove it), because that last mile and a half was all uphill. I may have even interspersed my running with a few seconds of walking so as to not make it a complete zone 5 effort. When I got back to my car, it told me that the temp was up to almost 80, which felt much more realistic. For some reason I always expect the basin to have cooled off while I was up on the mountain cooling off, but it has yet to happen. So it was back to August and bright sun. It was a nice little vacation though. 

I have GOT to make this at least a weekly trip, and with all the time off I'm about to have, it may be a realistic possibility.

Here's my trail, but last year, when it was sunny and dry.

This little snake didn't move a millimeter even when I got up right next to him to check him out. I think he thinks he blends a little better amongst those rocks than he actually does.

new end of season goals

I've decided that this is definitely not my year for Ironman, so instead of demonstrating another famous Joy meltdown, I'm going to take my $150 and run. Or just spectate. Or maybe do a little running while I spectate. But Jeremy's still in, so I need to at least do partial workouts with him, so I don't sit on the couch gaining weight while he gets leaner and meaner. Plus, I'm totally doing the base triathlon in 6 weeks. If I can win by 40 minutes like I did at a small race last year (I beat 6 whole women), that will be the icing on the cake. I haven't actually been challenged by one of my tri class participants, but I took it as a challenge when she proclaimed that another beginner would "probably win overall." I'm pretty sure she based this on looks and attendance in aerobics classes. You know, because that translates to triathlon speed. 

So I'm running, swimming and riding my bike a little. I even did a run on base in the middle of the day yesterday, since it was partly cloudy, not super hot, and I had brought my sunscreen and sleeves. I wasn't running very fast, so I was caught off guard when suddenly I needed a bathroom. The problem was that I was not within 15 minutes of one, and the places to squat were minimal. Here's my trail.

It may appear that I'm running in the middle of nowhere, but actually there was a road a few hundred feet to my right. And while the bush in the center looks substantial, I quickly remembered that there are many surveillance methods in use out here. Namely that unmanned aerial vehicle that flew about 50 feet over my head. So no escape.

And while I can handle the heat of the noon sun when I have some cloud cover, I am barely able to handle the heat in my office or house these days. It's regularly 85 in the office, which for some reason is not being cooled appropriately this week. Then I get home to a house that will not cool down in time for me to sleep before midnight. While looking at the temperature last night -- it was still 95F at 8pm -- I came across this.

Ouch, Phoenix! I hope y'all don't have swamp coolers. It's 8pm there and still 112?? And the LOWS are in the 90s? As Jeremy said, how did that ever become a city? And thank goodness we're at a higher elevation.

There better be some kind of big cool down that happens between now and 12 weeks from now, when IMAZ happens. I'm not spectating in that weather.

And as a final note, I'm very excited that my friend Rob, the super badass 65-year-old, won his age group at Sprint Nationals despite the heat and giving up after the swim. Turns out even fast people give up on their races sometimes. Except then they come back and win. 

I've maybe given up on speed as a triathlete, so maybe I'll just come back some day and win something.

back to work, back to work

I don't think I've even logged into my blogger account since we returned to the States! Good thing I remembered my password. We returned just over a week ago and my internal time clock has yet to reset to Mountain Time. I could go to sleep at 8pm every night, and now getting up in the mornings has gotten harder and harder.

I got some exciting news and some disappointing news when I got back to work last Wednesday. Let's get the bad out of the way: due to a hiring freeze and some financial cuts, my job will be ending earlier than expected. I have 5 more weeks there. At least they gave me warning so I could use up all my PTO. 

The good news upon returning was my triathlon training class was ready to commence. I left with just the proposal of starting this class the Monday after my return and was excited that it was approved and had been advertised (a little). 

I think  it was about 7-8 years ago that I first started a triathlon class back at the U of Memphis. I had been recruiting spinning participants to come run or swim with me afterward for a few semesters, and finally we made it official. It was one of my best memories from grad school. I had a great time spinning, running, swimming and hopping across the aerobics room (those plyometrics really helped the running!), and I made some really great friends from it too. It's amazing how you can bond over looking ridiculous. 

This group training for the base triathlon has no idea what they're in for (I can make them also look ridiculous), but they seem to be willing participants and a really fun group. 

So, thinking back to your very first triathlon, what are some good tips for these guys and girls? I'm not even sure what I stressed over those first few times. By the way, it's a pool swim, so no swamp creatures to nibble toes.

One Year Down

We've officially been here in NM for over a year now (and as Jeremy just told me tonight, we have 683 or so days to go). And while the first few months crept along, since starting work, the days go by pretty fast. And that's one reason I've been such a terrible blog writer and even blog reader: work. Anything blogspot is blocked. I don't know what they expect me to do during my hours of boredom there.

It's a new season in southern NM, since the rains finally started. I think today was the first time I have driven through water on base. I even used the wipers once on my way home. Crazy, I know! And then it stopped. Thankfully I hadn't ridden my bike to work today. Since I have no races on the horizon, I've begun racing myself and those unfortunate mountain bike riders with the fat tires on my commutes. Usually in the mornings it's cool and calm, plus the ride descends about 300 feet from my house to work in a nice long false flat. Then it's the complete opposite on the way home: hot, sunny, windy, almost always a headwind, and a false flat that ascends. I can cruise at an easy 25 on the way out, and grind at 15 on the way back, if I'm lucky. I've tried to chat with the people I've caught on the road, but usually they just give a nod and go back to concentrating on their ride, so I go on by. Apparently I've been recognized as the one who does the chicking (it's not my fault they don't know it's a race), so that's more encouragement.

It has cooled down a bit; tonight's run was downright pleasant. June is supposedly the hottest month in this desert, and it proved to be this year. Even without significant humidity, I can tell you that 107F with the sun blazing down and no shade within a 30 minute drive can make for a tough run. But with cloud cover, and especially rain, comes relief!

But we're leaving all this behind in just a few short hours! Thirty-six to be exact (and I haven't started packing). Most of my internet time is spent planning for the Italy trip. There's so much history, and so many things to see, that it's almost impossible to narrow down into 14 days everything I'm interested in. So back to the travel plans, and maybe a little packing. And hopefully in a few days, with a little internet service, I can post some updates and pictures. Ciao!

Summertime

My summer seems to be divided up in my mind based on visitors and vacations. Races have been sprinkled in there, adding to the trip side. I got started with a trip to Santa Fe, that marked the official beginning of summer on Memorial Day weekend. Then it was off to California, followed by a visit from Charlie, and then last week was a visit from Jenny and her clan. 

We filled the days with hiking

swimming in the waterfall (naked, if you were under 2)

hydrating

sliding

sledding

and playing Rock Band.

The extra long weekend went by super fast, and next thing I knew it was Sunday and we were headed to the airport in El Paso to say goodbye :(

The weather has gotten a lot cooler around here and the rains are coming. We had a few sprinkles in the basin, and up on the mountain, the Forest has even reopened. Mornings are so nice with cool temps and little wind, so I've been trying to ride my bike to work more often. It really only takes about 30 minutes as opposed to 15 to go those 10 miles. Some afternoons, I get a straight on headwind for the 7 miles on the highway, but it's going by faster and faster. They keep adding obstacles in my path. For the last few months a section of road right outside my neighborhood has been torn up, leaving rough pavement and thick gravel for a few hundred yards. This week they dug a 4 foot trench on my only exit road from the neighborhood. It requires a dismount and hike of the bike, but doesn't slow me down too much. We'll see what they throw at me next.

One more week of riding and then we are off to Italia for two weeks! The itinerary isn't set quite yet, and I keep thinking of more and more places to visit. There will be little riding, hopefully a good bit of running and hiking, and definitely some swimming in the Mediterranean. One week from tomorrow we leave!