RACE ACROSS AMERICA

Happy Holidays!

2011-12-04T10:30:00.001-08:00

I know this blog has been dormant a bit lately, but stay tuned! I definitely have some good things in the works.

It's December, which means its my annual post of the best band on the planet doing their annual Christmas jingle:

How can you not be in a good mood after watching this!! Robots doing the robot? Seriously...

Have a great holiday season everyone!

Pohono Trail Adventure

2011-07-07T18:06:00.000-07:00

We had permits to do the infamous Half-Dome hike on Sunday, but mother nature has had her way with the Sierra this past winter, and so the route was still deemed unsafe for the cables to go up due to snow and water runoff. While some dude did mention that he saw people doing the climb a few days prior with caribiners, I opted for the 'minimal death risk' approach, and decided to fall on to our backup plan. While Michelle was bummed, I welcomed the opportunity to be forced to go back to Yosemite eventually for a third time, or maybe even more to ascend what is the most recognizable hike of this great park. As a backup plan, I had been considering Clouds Rest or the Pohono Trail - both of which are different than half-dome by the shear fact that you generally don't see a lot of people, whereas the dome cables can more mimic a traffic jam, rather than being out in the wilderness.

umm...

We spoke with the ranger on Friday about Pohono, and he mentioned that during the prior weekend, there had been reports of impassable terrain due to snow cover. I didn't really think much of it for some reason (uh, impassable means they had to turn around), but I think it subconsciously drew me to doing the hike.

We started the hike at about 6:30am Sunday morning, where we gave our friends instructions to pick us up at Glacier Point, about 14 miles, and 8-9 hours later. If we hadn't seen them by about 10 hours later, then it would time to worry. Not having a backup plan, cell service, or much else to fall back on, we started the hike without a care in the world.

Generally, I was excited about the hike. It is one the least 'advertised' hikes in the park, as evident by it not being on the brochure handed out to just about everyone within the park's boundaries. It was also 14 miles in the wilderness, with minimal crowds. However, I had this slightly odd feeling that there was a little something missing. Maybe it was the 22 miles and 10,000ft of elevation worth of hiking that we traversed in the 2 days prior that left my legs a little (lot) sore, or getting up at 430am everyday that left me tired and a little groggy at the start - who knows.

The first 3 miles are basically straight uphill, and we eventually came out to a point where we found some people just waking up in their campsite right off the trail. We stopped and had a quick breakfast, chatted with some guy for a few moments who was going in the same general direction and then we got on our way.

We eventually found snow, and after about 5 minutes of guessing where to go, we saw that one guy from the previous stop who was completely lost on where to go, and he gave up and started walking back to the start. I motioned to him that we were going in the right direction, but he wanted nothing of it. Fine by me! About a minute later, we came across this couple who was walking towards us. I mentioned that they should keep track of the footprints through the snow, and his reply was right to the point: "that's nothing man", and then went on to describe how him and his wife were going to do Pohono trail yesterday, but after many patches of snow, and not enough trail, they decided to turn back and not even do it. They also showed us on the map where things start getting a little sketchy - and naturally, it was off the map.

Yes, that's me in there...

His wife then mentioned that it's "possibly doable with a compass" (she actually pronounced it like comp-ass, which I still find funny), and I quickly recalled the Wilderness Basics FAIL conscience decision I made earlier that morning to not bring my compass for some unknown reason. We thanked them for their heads up, and I immediately got excited. I went into total problem solving mode. It wasn't about the ego saying "I have to make it through the other side", it was about "How can we make it through?". I was totally stoked for the adventure aspect, as that what was missing at the start of the hike.

Where's my comp-ass?

We made it to the next few (lookout) points, and eventually came across 8 backpacking dudes, walking towards us. Naturally, we asked them where they came from, hoping it was Glacier Point (our destination), which they did. Through the thick german accent, we gathered that the trail basically disappears, that we may or may not be able to find footsteps in the snow, and that even with a GPS, it was difficult for them.

I immediately relished the situation I was in, and totally got into the zone and started coming up with a plan on how we were gonna make it through. My approach was to look for footsteps, natural and man-made trail markers, along with doing my own scouting while Michelle stayed put so as to not lose a point of reference. Ultimately, using the basic 'map trace back' function on the garmin to get back to the Tunnel (start) was the backup plan that I really didn't want to consider. Michelle started getting quiet, sure signs of stress, and my head was going at full throttle. Good stuff.

This is a bridge, made of um, frozen water.

We took a relaxing break at Dewey point, where we enjoyed some incredible ridge lines heading down into the valley, before heading into the back country.

The next few hours were all business with zero small talk. It wasn't an exceptionally stressful experience, but all systems were on full alert. Sunglasses came off frequently to identify any markers, along with constant discussion on where to go. I was looking for signs of trail, and Michelle was worried about being eaten by bears or mountain lions. While both were essential for survival, I found mine much more productive.

Zero Trail

We were faced with disappearing trail, numerous water crossings that barely had enough natural resources to cross (eg. fallen trees) due to all the water from the snow melt, long stretches of snow where footprints couldn't easily be deciphered, not to mention just being "out there" when there are search and rescue helicopters that have been searching for people ever since we arrived at the park a few days prior. Like I said before, Yosemite isn't idiot-proof, and I like that. Across all this varied terrain, Michelle ended up taking over at times to lend a fresh pair of eyes. After a while, all the lack of trail looks the same! She quickly got her bearings, had some fun, and we arrived unscathed at Taft point, with smiles on our faces.

After wards, while hiking from Taft point to Sentinel dome, I was telling Michelle about a conversation I had with my buddy Shawn, when we were discussing Aron Ralson's story (the dude from 127 hours who had to cut his arm off to get out alive). While some of the things he did in life were risky and to most people dumb, there is an element of confidence, experience and adventure that is built from being in those risky situations, and ultimately coming out on top. A lot of that is in his book, rather than in the movie. It goes against the modern day grain of constantly seeking comfort, an ignites small taste of that visceral feeling of survival in less than ideal conditions.

After descending Sentinel dome, we made the 1 mile trek over to Glacier point. In the last quarter mile, we somehow managed to lose the trail, twice, and laughingly made it to back to our destination. I may have mis-spoke when I said Yosemite isn't idiot proof, as evident by the .04 mile marker before Glacier point:

.04 mile marker sign to a destination. Really?

As we finished out the last 211.2 feet, I immediately was greeted with a weird level of stress and anxiety that I hadn't felt in about 24 hours - which is about the last time I descended from the simple, peaceful and beautiful wilderness into a place where swarms of people on cell phones, eating ice cream, kids running around screaming, obesity, and just general congestion that clogs Yosemite every summer. We finally found Desi and Rich, and made our way out of the park, already planning our next trip before having left the borders of this great place.

While this wasn't a life or death type situation, it made for a very fun and adventurous day in the park, and hopefully a good story to read!

Yosemite Round 2

2011-06-24T11:10:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, 4 of us went up to Yosemite for a 5-day weekend in the woods. The original intent was to climb half-dome on Sunday, but with the Sierra getting about 50% more snow than normal, there was still enough snow on the top & sides of the infamous structure to delay the cables going up until about 3 days later, rendering us to come up with a plan B. Fortunately, plan B provided enough adventure for my next post.

We ended up staying outside of the park, which at first was viewed as a PITA, but in hindsight, is the way to go during the Disneyland season of Memorial Day to Labor Day. Resting in Mariposa/Midpines, I insisted on getting up at 430am everyday, so that we could avoid the "morning commute". This was the scene at about 4:40am everyday for us:

Water boiling, coffee mugs ready to accept hot water and starbucks readybrew:

Friday, we tackled the Upper Yosemite trail, with a little off-shoot onto Yosemite point. Shortly after parking the car, we could see the moon just about to go in hiding before we started our day:

It didn't take long to walk and get excited about what we were about to go and see:

Upper & Lower Yosemite falls:

The trail is a little unique such that it takes you away from the falls a bit, which ended up adding to the dramatic effect. As I turned a corner, a heard, and felt, a boom that instinctually made me think of an earthquake, avalanche or rock slide. Nope, it was the not-so-constant roar of North America's highest waterfall raging at over 2,000 gallons per second and running at 384% the capacity of last June.

We made our way up to Yosemite point, affording us unique views of the valley, that we'd only continue seeing in the next few days, only from better vantage points. Below, you can get a slight taste of the flooding experienced in Yosemite valley from all the run off:

On the way back down, we found a little unadvertised off-shoot from the main trail that allowed for better viewpoints of some of the main attractions:

Upper Yosemite, with Half Dome in the background, under a blue sky that can only be replicated in the Sierra:

Looking down over lower Yosemite, with mother nature putting on a show of her own:

As I was taking the above photo, some clouds rolled in over the top of Yosemite falls, making for an almost seamless transition of white clouds over white water, metaphorically, as if water was falling from the sky:

If you look closely, you can see a rope going over the falls, which is for people to walk across. Down in the infamous camp 4 section, you can find people practicing. Yeah, no thanks.

Saturday, we tackled 4 mile trail, followed by the Panoramic trail. We actually walked away from the trail start, so that we could get a glimpse of some of the flooded areas:

In the calmness of the morning, both from campsites, and in nature, can be some of the best times to catch views like this, without anyone around:

4 Mile trail is about 4 miles straight up via way too many switchbacks, providing vantage points from the other side of the valley.

Here is El Cap, waking up from through the trees:

Once we saw this view, we knew we were getting to the end of our little 4 mile warm up. It's funny when you see little overhangs like this, because you think "I could totally go hang out on the rock", but once you get up to it, there's not a chance in hell I would do so:

After quickly stopping at Glacier point from some food, we got on our way to Panaramic Trail over to Nevada Falls, with a few stops along the way.

One of my favorite things about this park is that it isn't idiot proof. Desi likened it to a death trap. There are so many places in the park where there aren't poles, or any kind of safety mechanism to prevent you from something that Darwin would laugh at. Hell, even Yosemite wonders how many every year (top left):

Arriving at Nevada falls, I was eager to compare how different it would be now, compared to when we were there last October. While Yosemite falls had a non-rhythmic sound, Nevada falls more like a Jet Engine. As expected, the water was absolutely dumping over the falls, giving new meaning to the trail below it called "The Mist Trail":

Tack on the next days hike which will get it's own post, and I am a changed man from being in the wilderness for 3 days. I think anyone who has done such a thing probably "gets it". It's no reason why the below conversation happened, and I'm sure glad it did:

Sedona Mountain Biking Trip

2011-05-31T11:38:00.000-07:00

Happy belated Memorial Day to everyone! I just got back from a killer mountain biking trip in Sedona, AZ – otherwise known as the WAMBAM: Weekend of Arizona Mountain Biking And Manliness. I met up with college hombres Jeff and Dan (of IMLP ’08 lore) for a refreshing long weekend of catching up, sharing some laughs & beers and ripping some of the most awesome single track I’ve ever ridden – during the day and night, in an area that that warranted “Damn, it’s beautiful here!” more times than I can count.

My kind of bike shop (Bike & Bean):

Dan charging this rock, showing off the (hairy) guns:

It’s hard to argue with how well the housing blends in with the natural environment, and I’m a huge fan:

Yup:

View from our pad:

Jeff, 4 years removed from kicking cancer’s ass, in front of courthouse butte:

Even though the conditions can be gnarly, don’t be afraid to look up every now and then:

Butte Silhouette:

Dusk riding

Dan ripping down a step:

Shortly before we donned our headlamps for some extra sweet night riding...

Injury Update: Almost a year later to get to good news

2011-04-19T17:33:00.000-07:00

Back in January, I had exchanged some emails with the Brian Hill, president of Rehab United, about how to deal with a leg length discrepancy, based on the theories that were developed this past fall. I basically told him that 24 (freakin!) sessions of PT was a step in the right direction, but wasn't where I thought I'd be - especially having tried ART and Acupuncture as well. He offered to take a second look, and I took him up on this offer.

Shortly before my first meeting with Brian, Ryan posted this link, and this just struck a chord with me. I know that it is the internet and all, but it really seemed related to the types of issues I had been experiencing. I remained cautiously optimistic that things might actually make sense.

I met with Brian one afternoon, and after a mere 15 minutes of some observations and tests, he said that he doubts that I have a leg length discrepancy, and that the core of the issue is some extremely tight hip flexors [psoas to you non-physiology folk], and possibly a tight Iliacus that was causing my pelvis to become twisted in a 3D manner. The image that really brought it all together for me (I'm a visual person, so I need to "see" this to believe it) was the one from the link Ryan posted. Looking at the pelvic anatomy how the psoas connect from your femur to the lower lumbar (and everything in between), once those bad boys get tight, it can wreak havoc!

He quickly rigged up a contraption that compensates for tight hip flexors, and immediately, all my tests pointed to zero pelvic tilt. He prescribed some stretches and some rather dynamic exercises, and we scheduled a follow up appointment for 2 weeks. within those 2 weeks, I made arguably more progress than I had in 2 months of PT during the fall. Immediately, the stoke factor was through the roof!

So, how and why the tight hip flexors? I doubt that I could point to one thing, but riding in the aero position for hours on end, running long distance, not stretching the right areas enough and sitting too much are probably the main culprits. Ironically, it was the right psoas that caused the left knee bursitis/ITBS I dealt with last year. Go figure.

I realized the other day that having been injured on 1-MAY of last year, this entire process took nearly a %@#$ YEAR to get fixed! I won't lie, it has been a total energy, time, financial and emotional suck. But committed I remain to the end goal, and so I press on. Certainly there were lessons of perseverance learned along the way, along with never give up, no matter what crazy theories and statements ("maybe PT isn't right for you") people throw your way. No one knows your body better than you, so don't let them tell you what is right, and what is wrong, no matter how many letters they have after their name showing how many certifications they've earned, if it doesn't sit right.

I also want to thank some good friends, fellow dream crushers, who don't accept the status quo in life, that helped along the way. Frank who, from the east coast, offered advice and videos of rehabbing ITBS, Shawn having always lent an ear, James J and his advice and opinions, Tawnee for giving some pointers and opinions on rehab, Matt, who while across the pond, I can still chat with as if he was driving me across the US, James W with his constant positive comments, Trevor who has "been there" and giving me some recommendations of things to try and also offering encouragement, Slater for inspiring with extreme dream crushing and recommending Doreen (she's awesome!) for specific, "hands on" yoga to release those psoas, and Toby, who "gets" that when you do things like RAAM and 100 mile runs, its hard to find that next adventure that offers the right balance of challenge, experience, adventure that raises the bar. And of course my family and girlfriend Michelle who had to deal with some frustrations and crankiness on my part!

I do have a few things that I am working to keep those psoas limber so that the next time I see Bryan, it will be either doing a strength session, or having a beer - NOT doing PT!

WBC: Snow camp in Mammoth!

2011-04-13T13:33:00.000-07:00

The last camping excursion for the Wilderness Basics Course was a snow camp. As the name implies, we camp in the snow! As it was with J-Tree, there was a lot of chatter about the weather we were planning to get, and as the pictures will tell, it lived up to the expectations.

Friday, we boarded buses, made the long drive up to Mammoth Lakes, got into town around 1130ish, and slept in a high school gym before leaving for the trail head at 8am the next morning. When we woke up, we looked out the windows to the sweet views of snowing already coming down by 630am. To give you an idea of what we were dealing with:

I was super stoked for the day. My group leader tasked me with leading the group for the first ~1.5 miles of a ~2mile trek to camp using just the map and compass. Having done Adventure Races in the past, I wasn't a complete noob, and was glad I got to fine tune the skills. Below is a pic of the GPS track we took. We started at the bottom right of the red line, and I got us to the Inyo Craters issue free. Score! (The route we took on Saturday is the most direct line, as opposed to the loop on a road we took on Sunday b/c someone broke their snowshoe)

I had never been snowshoeing before, so I wasn't sure what to expect. Leading the group, I was in front, and 30ft in, I had already fell on my ass! It took a little while getting used to snowshoeing through 2 feet of powder, but I eventually got into a groove. Richard also provided some sage advice to the tune of "slow down, or you'll kill yourself". Point noted!

Here's a little video:

After about 30 minutes of leading the group, a couple dudes wanted to come to the front and have some time blazing the trail. I'm 5'7'', had never been snowshoeing before, and had no trekking poles (apparently, the only one who didn't) - I was at a severe disadvantage. After a few minutes of being at the front, there were grown men falling over, and saying "F this" after being in the front for a few 5 minutes! Here's that video of the slow pace... good times!

It's a lot of work! But, its a lot of fun too. A side benefit is with all the work you do - you don't get cold. Thank god for pit zips on my hard shell - I was getting warm!

After 3.5 hours, we finally made it the 2 miles to camp. The wind had picked up over the course of the day, and we were in a little valley next to a crater. We quickly got to work, stomped out a site for our tents, and started making some ice igloos.

After we got the 2nd layer up, we realized the snow wasn't sticking enough to make the igloo, so we abandoned the idea, and went with the fortress/snow kitchen. Basically, we made some 3-4 walls to shield ourselves from the wind, complete with a bench, and table.

Add some camping stoves, and we're in business!!

After dinner, the temp dropped, and when the sun isn't up and you don't have a fire - there isn't much reason to stay awake (unless you're drinking, which I actually gave up for lent!), you go to "bed". It was definitely cold at night, about 18 degrees, and I slept about as good as I could, given the conditions.

Sunday morning, we packed up, destroyed the snow kitchen, and made quick work back to the trail head under some beautiful blue skies.

In the pic below, you can barely see the tracks we made the day prior, which was covered up by all the snow and wind...

One of the Inyo Craters...

"Inside" one of the craters...

Last, but not least, arguably one of my favorite pictures, which needs no explanation:

Shortly after that, we boarded the buses, and pointed it south towards San Diego.

This was definitely an epic weekend, and really opened my eyes and perspective as to what you can do if you have the right gear - regardless of weather conditions. Good stuff!

Spring & Shades

2011-04-11T09:03:00.000-07:00

Hope you all had a good weekend! I think spring is just about here, and below is a nice little shade of it taken from atop a balcony...

Good stuff to come soon!

WBC: Joshua Tree Backcountry

2011-03-22T11:54:00.000-07:00

A little late in posting this!

About 3.5 weeks ago, there were news reports saying that some gnarly storm was coming into SoCal, and that we should prepare for the worst. Grocery stores starting running out of food, those in the east county started gathering supplies like Burt and Reba from Tremors, snow levels were going to drop to lower elevations, screams of "hide ya wife, hide ya kids" could be heard 'round the county, and so on. Ok, a little much, but it was the usual exaggerated SoCal-doomsday-weather-forecast-just-because-we're-getting-wind-and-rain.

Well, that weekend was our scheduled land navigation camping trip, and this time, we chose the back country of Joshua Tree. Friday night camping would be at 3300ft, and after navigating through some back country, we'd finally setup camp around 4200ft. The main attraction for the trip was the top notch bouldering we'd encounter, along with fine tuning my rusty navigation skills.

Knowing that the snow level was indeed dropping that weekend, along with lots of wind (up to 50mph gusts), rain and even snow, even I was a little concerned. Partly because my winter gear hadn't come in yet, leaving me with a long sleeve running jersey and a wind/water resistant cycling jacket to fend the elements with, and partly because I didn't want to be miserable all weekend. Fortunately, I learned later, my friend Erin was going to let me borrow some Gore-tex bad ass jacket to keep me warm.

Friday morning, an email came out from WBC saying that all camping trips were canceled. 15 minutes later, our group leader emails us all says: "I don't cancel my trips, game on!" Time to man up!

The drive out had a few highlights. The visual highlight was driving past the base on San Jacinto, which was covered in snow, and just after sunset, had a majestic feel to it. The audio highlight is another story. After passing by a local casino, they were advertising that both Huey Lewis and the news, and even Meatloaf were going to be playing there soon. This prompted an immediate need to hear things like Paradise by the dashboard light, and The Power of Love and This is it. Go ahead, click those links, I dare you. Unfortunately, this song also came on, and it stayed stuck in my head nearly all weekend. I highly advise that you not watch that video.

Anyhow, enough text, more pictures!

Saturday morning wake up view:

The next 2 pictures are for when I was sitting in my car because some people wanted to leave a campsite to drive 20 minutes into town to go to starbucks, and then come back to the campsite. I thought that was a bit "much" in a Wilderness Basics Course, so I opted to stick around (but was completely OK with them bringing me coffee). So, I sat in my car, out of the rain, when it was 39 degrees...

... and proceeded to eat Peanut Butter and Jelly straight from both jars, with the same spoon, going back and forth. Personally, having PB and J in one spoonful is optimal!

At the start of the hike, I had to bundle up...

This is Michelle's first "run" in with the Jumping Cholla tree. After this, we both have been very diligent not to run into these, nor let them run into us. They have the "Jumping" in their name for a reason! Mind you, having not been attacked by one yet, she yelled out a scream, so naturally I was like "stay there, don't move - let me get a picture!" not knowing how painful it was for her. After I carefully pulled it out, it actually landed on me, and my respect for the Cholla grew! Damn that hurt!

The desert can be a rough place for some...

High Desert

It was snowing in this picture. For real.

I had the responsibility of navigating from here, to somewhere over "there"... always fun off trail!

Snow covered mountains in the distance...

After we got to our destination, which is this big rock structure in the middle of the valley to shield us from the howling winds, we started eating dinner. Let me tell you, when you are living outside and its that cold, people will still walk 75ft away from camp, just to be in the sun a little bit longer for some warmth...

Some gnarly boulders we just, um, bouldered. FUN!

Where I needed to go:

Some of the gnarlyness we just bouldered down...

Even though I had my reservations about the weather, and even though Saturday was one of the worst nights of "sleep" I've ever had, I had an absolute blast during this weekend meeting new people, and learning new things.

Notes and Lessons Learned:

There are no fires permitted in the back country, and when its in the 20's, buddy burners don't do squat!

When its cold out, and you are cold, the last thing you feel like eating is cold food. Bring some sort of stove, and make some hot food!

Sleeping outside when its 23 degrees takes a little getting used to!

When its cold and you are near "elevation", drink more water, or headaches are imminent!

Bouldering is a ton of fun, and might have ignited a desire to rock climb!

WBC: Villager Peak

2011-03-15T12:57:00.000-07:00

We interrupt this irregularly scheduled blog posting (it's been a while since I've posted, hasn't it?) to let you know that there is some good news coming on the injury front, but really to tell the world of the ass whoopin' I received this past weekend!

First a little background. I'm doing the San Diego Sierra Club Wilderness Basics Course, and there are 4 camping weekends. This past weekend was the third: Desert and Mountain Backpacking. The prior one in J-Tree gets its own mention (we got snowed on), but since the shellacking is so fresh in me, I am inspired to write.

After hearing lots of tales and urban lore of this guy Steve and his crazy ass hikes, we thought we'd see what all the fuss is about. Steve is a 10 year old in a 40-something year old body, and is crazy, hilarious and a little "cuckoo". This says a lot. Trust me.

The hike was advertised as a 7 mile hike up to Villager Peak (5750 ft), but all of that elevation gain would be in "about 5 or 6 miles" after scramble across the desert floor. After doing the math, that's an average 16-18% grade for a long time. Most of you fit athletes reading that are probably barely raising an eye at grades like that that you eat for breakfast. The challenge however lies in things like couple pound, higher-than-ankle hiking boots, and about 40 lbs of backpacking gear resting on your hips & back. For the endurance-athlete-learning-mountaineering, it's an adjustment (but much welcomed)! Additionally, it was a game time decision early Saturday morning (4:30am) since I left work early on Friday due to illness and was unsure if I could be "up" to the challenge.

Note: All pictures don't even come close to doing the justice.

The main ridge line (not including the summit), as seen from Borrego Springs:

... and from the base:

While there is no path in this Google Earth image, if you follow the little green icons from my car, to the one in the top left (the peak), that's pretty much the path we took:

Relentless is a great way to describe the hike. It's like being on the most scenic stairmaster for about 7 hours. It's pretty much straight up, with a few flatter spots for recovery, and a few spots well into the 25% grade range. Hands were used a few times to get up. Kind of like this:

One funny moment from the hike, I overheard this one woman say "... it takes them about 9 days to finish the thing, and they usually sleep about 2 hours a night...". I immediately jumped in and said "Oh, you must be talking about those crazy solo guys doing the Race Across America." Of course she was! She was reading a book about RAAM, and that led to a pretty fun conversation about strategy, pacing, not sleeping, and how doing RAAM on a team any less than 8 is psychotic! :)

By the time we stopped for lunch, I knew I was in trouble. It was 80 degrees in the desert, I wasn't thirsty, I wasn't really hungry, and I had cold sweats. I got kinda quiet, brooded and just kinda slipped into my own little pain cave. Right after lunch, we tackled this gnarly climb, and were greeted with some serious drops off to the left. This was right around the time the wind went from a nice, gentle cooling breeze to 20mph gusts. Perfect timing.

The terrain just kept on going up and up, and it is such where you can't actually see the peak until you are about 45 minutes away (mind you, 45 minutes looks like a stones throw, so its deceptive and teasing). We finally got to camp, and with a group of 18, I immediately scoured the area for a good camp spot that was sheltered from the wind. It also happened to provide some sweet views of rabbit peak as well, along with snow covered El Toro, San Jacinto, and San Gorgornio in the distance. Most importantly, we were away from the group and potential snore-ers (there's always one, right)?

Night fell, and I finally got to use some of my new GoLite gear. I picked up some new jackets recently with Toby's recommendations, and a great sale over at the clymb. We had some food, and I was starting to feel alright, and of course people had "stories" to share around the campfire. The night was perfect. Surprisingly warm (upper 40's), and the sky was hosting a shooting star show that nearly everyone got to see. It also was great to chat with people and hear about their adventures while not huffing and puffing.

The next morning, the group went on and did the 5 hour hike to Rabbit peak and back, but feeling like crap, I opted out of the hike and we decided to take off down the mountain.

Our cars are somewhere down there:

6 hours of quad pounding descent, and a few pics later...

We shall call this next one: "Don't Slip"

we made it back to the car and pointed it west. As of Tuesday morning, there is some serious DOMS in the legs. Already looking forward to the next trip!

Notes and Lessons learned:
Mummy (sleeping) bag: I don't think I'm a fan - legs feel too restricted.

On hikes like these: Ultra-lite gear is the way to go, and trekking polls would have been really nice.

Cherish the friends who can let you borrow cool stuff like little portable stoves & dishes.

2 gallons of water (the recommended minimum) was barely enough.

Although I am sure there are plenty of similarly challenging hikes, if anyone is training for a hilly event and wants to do a long, hard ass day hike (without the sleep over), do this hike, but be careful, as the trail can disappear at times!

I brought an uncharged Garmin. The lesson learned is obvious!

2011: Offseason

2011-02-11T16:19:00.000-08:00

I have been having a hard time trying to classify how I think 2011 will be for me in training and racing. After much thought, the best way for me to describe it will be "Offseason". Why such a title?

In the offseason, people generally back off considerably on training volume, have a few more beers than they usually do, sleep in, read more, skip a Saturday ride and not feel guilty, see friends they don't see as often, maybe start working more on strength training or their weaknesses and do things they don't normally do during the season.

And this is exactly how I plan on spending my season this year! (except I do not plan on swimming!)

Under Chuckie's guidance, I definitely accomplished way more than I thought I was capable of. It was structured training, but not always. There were some "caveman" workouts thrown in there at least a couple times a week where I was to train by feel - to get in touch with how the motor was firing, not just being concerned with the output, and to not rely on data (gasp!). The Yang to that Yin was also spending a considerable amount of time watching and chasing certain numbers on the yellow head unit that sits a top my stem (as quite a few coaches would prescribe). Coupled with not training with people enough, and an injury that no one can figure out (keeping my fingers crossed: yet), I got kinda burnt out on endurance training. I tried slowly re-introducing it back in January, and there was some digression in the rehab department, and so I resigned myself from doing any endurance training until I can get some stuff squared away.

I was kinda ready for a little change of pace, and was stoked that my Christmas gift from Michelle was doing a Wilderness Basics Course through the Sierra Club. Having just watched 127 hours, reading the book, then reading Miracle in the Andes, it re-sparked a sense of adventure and doing some thing new that had been missing since after doing RAAM in 2009 not to mention that reading these stories of triumph through adversity was fairly moving. (Quick aside: I was sweating during "the scene" in 127 hours, and when I read the book).

Now, do I plan on setting myself up in situations that are life threatening? Absolutely not! But, if & when I do get back into any type of training, there needs to be a sense of adventure with it. After having done 2 Ironman's and RAAM twice, I can definitely say that my thought process and mentality towards the two are completely different, and that I enjoy the mental aspects of training for RAAM (or similar challenge) way more. It's rather hard to quantify and describe in words, but maybe I'll try to do so in a subsequent blog post.

This year will also be a year of experimentation - partly influenced by Tim Ferriss' latest book, partly by the last time I was experimenting with my diet and I found out what really works for me, and partly wanting to find out what other things work for me athletically. I definitely want to try adding more more cross functional and "natural" exercise routines, such Mark's Workout of the Week, MovNat, CrossFit, rock climbing, along with some strength training programs at Rehab United. If you look at a world class athletes like Jonas Colting who does this type of stuff a few times a week, I'd be foolish not to start making that part of my routine in the event I do hop back on the bike and start running again. (I'm trying to come up with a comment for Slater who was just nipping on his heels during all of Ultraman, and I am still amazed by that dude!)

So, until some challenge comes along that sparks my interest (I'm willing to hear suggestions!), and the chassis can support the training, this blog may be a little quiet on the training front. Until then, I'm off to do some camping this weekend, and looking forward to doing some snowcamping in Mammoth with WBC next month!

Train hard, and (most importantly) have fun!

ps: I want to get a Mountain Bike.

pps: Here are some pics from my 30th birthday a few weeks ago. Remember what I was saying about not feeling guilty about missing a Saturday bike ride?

Me "taking my time" doing my first jump, and then finally doing the plunge:

Me on jump #2 of 3

Erin posing:

Greg's facial expression says it all:

My facial expression also says it all (click to zoom) during an elevator drop - described by the man who invented bungee jumping in North America - "Ten times scarier than any other jump you could do" (confirmed).

If you want to know why it's so scary, check out this video of the guy describing it (if you can hear him above people making fun of me and me roaring about how bad ass it is!)

The crew:

Beach!

2011-01-24T20:28:00.000-08:00

The weather in socal for the past two weeks has been nicer than it has been since .... about 2009 (ok, I'm spoiled). 75 & sunny with a light breeze just about everyday. I almost want to drop an F bomb on how nice it has been!

I headed to the beach (3 times!) on Sunday. First to check out the waves, second to take pictures (after going back to get my camera), and third to do a primal-esque workout (throwing boulders and such) that would make Mark himself proud. There was some nice Santa Ana's that were making for some sweet conditions.

Boy chases girl, girl goes running; nice reflection from water:

Dogs running everywhere - Happiness:

Got spray?

Roy, Roy, Corduroy. Better start paddling!

Not from the beach day, but worthwhile posting. The first two were from a killer moonset morning:

The Cardiff Kook, in typical fashion:

Moonset sesh at swami's:

Not sunset, but quite the sunrise back on December 6th. Who needs fireworks when you have this?

2010 in review

2011-01-20T10:54:00.000-08:00

Not sure where to start on this one, except that my blog needs some massive resurrection! This is my fashionably late "2010 season in review" blog post. Pardon the length. I am writing this partly as a log for me, and after not blogging in too long, I learned (again) that I definitely enjoy writing (even if the writing may not show!). This post is definitely reflective in nature, and will probably require a coffee (or beer) to get through (if you can!).

*****
2010 was intended to be a BIG year. I had a boatload of fun with IMLP in 2008, and the pain train continued with Wildflower and RAAM in 2009. What better way to go big and have a lot more fun than to do an Ironman and RAAM in the same year, right? Well, I think my eyes & dream crushing were a little over zealous, and things kind of caught up to me. 2010 ended up having a couple different themes, some of which were about imbalance and how to not live a sane life, and is broken up into 2 sections: the first 6 months, and the second 6 months.

The first 6 months was tipped towards the "major athletic endeavors" side in trying to achieve a piece of the BAMF pie: Ironman St. George on May 1st, then Race Across America 6 weeks (to the day!). A bike race across the continent is kind of a big deal, yet Chuckie called it a "mid season reset". HA. This was the same guy that encouraged me to do T-run's after my RAAM shift's too! Easily the most absurd "encouragement" I have ever received. He is a funny guy I tell ya.

One of the lessons learned over the year was around motivation. When I signed up to do IMLP in '08, it was partly because I had an interest in doing an Ironman, but also b/c my good friend Jeff was recovering from his 2nd bout of cancer, and was signed up, along with some other friends of ours. It was a cool motivating factor that helped get my butt outta bed in the morning, but I also learned something about myself at mile 12 on the marathon when I was "hurtin". A second wind, mental reset, philosophical conversation with myself and 5 minutes later, I went from "this sucks" to "life is effing great" and negative split my first run over 14 miles by 14 minutes. My stance & advice for those who were thinking of signing up for an Ironman was that you better know some real reasons for signing up for such a thing, because when things get tough in training and during the race, you will want that/those reason(s) to fall back on for motivation to keep the fire hot. At that time, I personally thought that signing up for an Ironman because all one's friends were doing it was a dumb idea since I had such a "epiphany" during mine. Some people say that doing an Ironman is a life changing experience. In some ways - not necessarily for the accomplishment, but THE PROCESS, did so for me.

Fast forward a year. Boy meets girl who was signed up for an Ironman, Boy's friends are signing up for the same Ironman, Ironman falls on the weekend of Boy's favorite race (Wildflower), and so what does Boy do? Sign up for an Ironman because all his friends are doing one.

Training through this past shit winter was tough, and when things got tough, I didn't have that key motivator to keep the fire burning (partly because socal rain was putting it out every weekend!). That, I ended up doing most of my training solo. Now, I actually prefer that most of the time - but after months and months of it - it gets old. It's funny, there was a bunch of people from TCSD signed up for the race, and there was an training email group. I think if I was like "most" people and if some dude wrote an email saying "Hey, I'm riding 100 miles on Saturday, and doing 3 repeats up Palomar with a transition run afterwards on Sunday" in the middle of February - I'd be hitting the delete button.

Anyways, HTFU, It's an Ironman, a metaphor for life, I know. Once Chuckie and I got me out of my comfort zone, I pushed through, and when things really picked up, the training for IMSG became EPIC and I loved it! It was at this point when I realized (maybe, again) that I am all about the big/long/hard training - there's something about it, and it was getting me fired up! There was some chatter on the TCSD mailing list about people being scared b/c some USAT "coach" had to get off of his bike on a 12% grade during a course preview and people were freakin the eff out. My reply to everyone (and I don't reply often) was simply:

"Obviously, there is some level of fear for just about everyone going into this thing. But, fear is a good thing, so long as it is channeled in the right direction.

Think the course is gonna be hard? Train hard. Better yet - train harder. Think the course is gonna be the hardest thing you've ever done? Be stronger than you have ever been.

Train the body, train the mind. Get comfortable, with being uncomfortable. (and any other quote that will help motivate)"

Anyways, some highlights of training include numerous 5-7 hour quad busting hikes, leaving every part (well, not that part) of my lower body sore for days, Gnarly hill repeats (Torrey Pines x 10 @ LT one Tuesday afternoon and 2 weeks later I did 8 one day, then 6 the next), 10,000 yards of swimming in a 24 hour period (ugh), a 57 degree pool morning (!!), and my favorite: Making Palomar Mountain my bitch, repeatedly (Mountain repeats workout: 3 times in 3 months, with 2 times in ONE week!). The garmin graphic of my 4 repeat, 10,000ft day in February outing says it all:

Onto the race, IMSG didn't yield the results I was capable of, thanks to an unhappy left knee whose bark and bite due to bursitis (the first time I have ever been injured) was too much for me at mile 15, forcing a walk for the rest of the way. Grr.

Over the next 6 weeks, despite bad and conflicting advice saying cycling was OK when it really wasn't, I somehow salvaged enough fitness and the right amount of acute therapy modalities to get me to the start and finish line of RAAM. The mental challenge of dealing with the injury and inconsistencies proved most frustrating, but I did what I had to (and kicked major ass along the way, if I do say so myself). Regardless of the unblogged drama that happened, my "I'm just stoked to be here and kicking massive ass" perspective kept me above the fray.

In hindsight, RAAM 2010 is still kinda hard to describe how much that week freakin ROCKED. Getting to the start line was a race in and of itself. Regardless, that race is just SO MUCH FUN. I was known as "the linchpin" on the team - amongst other names like an "underpants wearing, sippy cup sportin, little cotton ball womans' sock wearin, try-athlete" reserved only for the true roadies of the team - because a couple guys who said they'd never do it again, belted out in January "I'm in if Denner's in" - and all the sudden we have the best team we've ever had. It put a little pressure on me to commit to the race, but I'm really glad I did. There's a certain team aspect that I didn't get with triathlon training that makes me want to join some sort of team/squad/something (next post type stuff right there).

After RAAM, it was time to figure this injury thing out for good, rather than putting on some figurative band-aids, which is the second half of my year. This set off a many month expedition of exploring the importance of physical balance, anatomical versus functional limb length discrepancies, flexibility, and overall physical conditioning (not just the sagittal plane [front, back] that is triathlon/endurance training) - that is still on going. This resulted in minimal training (and even exercising in general), which happened to coincide with too much work (stress). Add those 2 things together, and I was not a happy camper throughout the fall (hence the lack of posts), but used it as a time to pick up my oft neglected camera and spend some time thinking about future goals. Lemons, meet lemonade (kinda)

For the past 5 years, I had an "A" race planned at least a year in advance (ie. in '07, I was already committed to IMLP in '08; in '08, I was already committed to RAAM in '09), which gave me a goal and something to aspire to many months in advance. As of now, I don't have even a 5K on my calendar, and I'm quite OK with that.

Next post: 2011 - Onward.

Congratulations if you made it this far!

ps- I age up to M3034 next Thursday. Time to get to work!

Is this thing on?

2010-11-23T16:15:00.000-08:00

Obviously, I haven't blogged in some time. It's not that I haven't had anything to say (believe me, I have), I just haven't gotten to doing it. Unfortunately, it's a common theme when it comes to training too. It ain't happening.

The past few months have been challenging to say the least. Physically, I took time off of running and biking for fear that it would digress from what I was doing in Physical Therapy. I was told by multiple people that that was a "good idea". So, replace training (read: something I enjoy) with the stress of not being able to do so, the stress of wondering WTH is wrong with me (I never completely bought into "the theory"), and an increase of work stress led to me being one not-so-happy-little-camper. To go from the epicness of RAAM to nothing was borderline depressing honestly (btw, this recent post was written completely sarcastic, if you didn't 'get' it). Assuming that most (ie. 2 of the 3) of you who read this blog treat these athletic excursions as big things in your life, you can probably understand the situation sucked. I mean, really sucked.

But enough of the public blogospherical wound licking.

The time off was actually good (good call, Evan) from a "big picture" perspective. There were some life lessons to be learned, most of which were painful. I have looked back over my season, and realized what worked (Chuckie), what didn't (my lack of defined goals and motivation/inspiration), and what needs to be worked on (stretching, strength conditioning) - but, thats a topic for a different post.

Physical therapy is officially done after 24 sessions, and I am walking away feeling like it was a step in the right direction, but not the end-all-be-all. ART was good, but had diminishing returns with successive appointments. I did recently start acupuncture with a local guy who used to be a professional cyclist (gotta love doctors who "get it") and who has worked on numerous professional athletes. The acupuncture actually includes electric stimulation (yes, electricity running through needles that are 3 inches deep!) to help with muscle firing. Basically, I am surrounding myself with a group of advisors (See rule #2) to get me back to where I need to be - which is on the bike! The acupuncture seems to be helping in a subtle, but hard to describe way. One thing is for certain, it's hard not to fall asleep on that table!

One thing is certain though. I have been gettin' fired up about training again after some time off and getting on the right path. After watching Ironman Arizona and Jordan Rapp come back from massive adversity and Sonja run down her competition to win her AG - it lit a nice little fire under me. That, and the fact that I should be in Cozumel this weekend ready to throw down, but I'm not.

I'm getting fired up again, and it's a nice feeling, let me tell you!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. We all have a lot to be thankful for!

Some recent pics:

Sunset during some night in August (I can't remember the significance, but it had to with the moonrise. Toby, help!):

Moonrise over north county

The casino on Catalina island (Michelle ran the eco-marathon - gnarly course w/ 6,000ft of elevation gain! I just, uh, watched, from the comfort of the beach sipping one of many bloody mary's from the weekend)

Columbus Day Weekend Road Trip

2010-10-14T13:06:00.000-07:00

While the triathlon world was racing and spectating a little race on the big island, I had a pretty gnar road trip planned.

Thursday, Michelle and I left work early and drove up to the great town of Fresno. While some would get excited knowing that the big fresno fair was happening while we were in town, I can assure you that wasn't the reason why we were there!

Fresno was the rest stop for spending the day in Yosemite National Park on Friday. After spending my first time in Yosemite (only one day unfortunately), I will definitely say that this place lives up to the hype. If I had to sum up the park with one word, it would be VAST. I will definitely be going back sometime, for sure. Secondly, no pictures do the justice, but I will at least make an attempt:

El Capitan at sunrise

Vernal Falls

Nevada Falls from below

The view from atop Nevada Falls

Large rocks and Nevada Falls

Half Dome (which is now on "the list")

Royal Arches

Yosemite Valley (B+W) near sunset

Saturday, we headed over to San Francisco for my buddy Jeff's wedding, where it was good to catch up with some buddies from college, and I may have had a few too many adult beverages. Fortunately for you - no pictures from that!

Sunday, we took the 1/PCH from San Francisco down to Paso Robles. If you've never done this drive - definitely put in on your "list". This was my 3rd time, and it never gets old...

"Typical" View

Cliffs overlooking (lots of) ocean

A rare freshwater waterfall into the pacific

Towards the end of the drive, we stopped in Cambria for some more photo ops:

Cool "texture"

Sunset reflecting on a rock

More sunset on rock

Rays through the rocks

Water making an "ampitheatre" of sorts

Tracks

Sunset

In Paso Robles, we stopped at a rather familiar place for a little wine tasting as well. Not as scenic as the above pics, but you get the point. Last name bias aside, it was hands down the best tasting wine I've ever had!

25+ hours of driving 1,200 miles - definitely a solid weekend!

Injury Update: I'm effed up in 3D!

2010-09-30T14:15:00.000-07:00

This whole diagnosis and physical therapy has been quite the process so far, let me tell you (which, I guess, is what I'm doing). The cliff's notes version goes a little something like this:

My Rx for PT was "right leg ITBS", ironically, the opposite leg from a few months back, which immediately made me skeptical of my treatment. I put some faith in those who do this for a living, and went along with it, but still remained a little reserved since I know what I feel, not them.

One morning in the middle of September, I woke up with a stiff right lower lumbar (the same problem area that has been haunting me for years), and rather than discomfort, I had absolute pain. Like the pain where when you get to work at 7am (and I'm not talking about the pain associated with being at work at 7am), you realize you can't even work, and make a call to your doc at 7:01am and say "Whatever you prescribed isn't working." Fortunately, "stress is the fertilizer for creativity", and I walked over to my gym, and (I quote myself here) "rolled the hell out of my right glute" with the black/hard foam roller (not that I like large hard cylindrical things near my glutes, but desperate times call for desperate measures I guess). Why the foam rollers? Not sure, just seemed like the best thing to do for some reason. After 15 minutes of rolling out, where my perspective was "the more it hurts, the more I roll" (primarily in the piriformis and Gluteus Medius), I stood up, and 90% of my stiffness went away.

hhmmm... I'm onto something here. I think ART is in order if the Foam Roller worked that good.

Fast forward to Monday, I walk into PT at 7am, and tell the director and my PT about my Friday crisis, and the session turns into a re-assessment.

Here's the theory:

Because training for endurance sports demands so much from my body, any inefficiencies or discrepancies are exacerbated through big training. Because my right leg is shorter than my left leg, my body has compensated by anteriorly rolling my right pelvis down in the front, effectively "lengthening" my right leg. Because the right anterior pelvis rotated down, the rear part rotated up, which is what causes feelings of pressure and compression in my right lower lumbar. The below picture shows whats happening with just my right side:

(I don't know abnout you, but at a quick glance, the arrow almost makes the photo anatomically correct, except well, mine's not red ;)

On the other side of my pelvis, as another means of compensating, my left pelvis has rotated forward, but in a different direction. If you were looking at me from above, my left pelvis has rotated from 9 o'clock, towards 12 o'clock (fortunately, it hasn't gotten that bad yet, or else I'd look really funny).

In other words, I'm effed up in 3D.

So what does all mean? A LOT more PT, a lot of stretching, and a lot of me making sure I don't revert back to poor mechanics. Once I feel comfortable (mentally anyways) with re-introducing biking and running (which is on-hold at the moment), I will make core and strength work (as in, a lot of what my rehab is) mandatory. For right now, the only thing I'm focused on is getting better.

Also, I already have had 2 ART sessions, and let me tell you - this stuff is the REAL DEAL. I know of numerous people getting ART who rave about it, but I was skeptical - more in the sense that I didnt want to get my hopes up. No way - I'm sold now! Some funny things to note:

I was told that rather than having knots in my muscles, I have golf balls
The doc was working on a "golf ball", and the only thing he could say is "Dude...."
I need so much work, that he has hurt his thumb both times so far (bragging rights, I say, and we laugh about it)
When I told him that when the foam roller just doesn't cut it, the lacrosse ball works wonders. His response "that tells me a lot about the type of person you are".

While the above bullet points are comedic, the results are amazing. For the first time in about 6 years, I have no feelings of pressure in my back on a day-to-day basis.

Progress

ps- To all those racing and watching Kona next Saturday, have fun!

Month off

2010-09-14T12:00:00.000-07:00

In my month off, I certainly had some time to reflect, time to have fun, and had a lot of time in general. If I was training for Cozumel, I would have felt guilty for enjoying the following activities, but since I wasn't, I enjoyed them that much more...

Tahoe for Jeff's Bachelor party

First time playing paintball, at 8,200 ft no less. You can be out of breath by simply pulling the trigger, nevermind running over rocks in a full dickies style suit with a full face helmet, ducking for cover, and fighting for your life against your friends:

Vegas

The lady and I:

Nick tried challenging me to an absolutely absurd contest:

I liked this picture when I took it, but after looking at it a second time, I like it more because it looks like I am taking a leak in the pool:

Food PORN

Food porn is not a stranger in the sub-culture that is endurance sports blogging.

I cooked one bomb-ass meal for my lady's (I almost put "ladies", oops) birthday a few weeks ago: grass fed steak (me: medium rare rib eye, her: rare filet), green beans and carrots sauteed in butter, olive oil, garlic and shallots, yukon gold potato puree with butter, cream and parmesean cheese, a side summer salad with this dressing (recommended!), and a bottle of Avalon Cab to wash it down. It was freakin good.

Non-Specificity

I'm not in the picture, but this is where I work, and what I have been doing every other day during "lunch hour":

Mt. Laguna

Partly inspired by the recent piece in the NY Times piece called "unplugged", I did a solo camping trip a top Mt. Laguna to disconnect with society and technology to reconnect with mother nature (the "me" time was nice too, I will admit). Naturally, my first time on my bike in a month was spent trolling around at 6,000ft (take that Boulder! and I'm glad your fires are under control), and it was great.

The setup - simple, yet effective.

A must for camping

I have never seen so many holes in one tree. Woodpeckers paradise? Target practice for hicks? Gnarly producer of maple syrup?. Shawn, any ideas? Upon closer inspection were a number of acorns embedded in them. Nuts in holes? uh, I couldn't resist...

I love this picture, and the contrast it presents. Standing at 6,000ft atop a pine tree covered mountain, I overlooked the Anza Borrego desert, many thousands of feet below me:

Stomping grounds of the man...

The road through my rear view mirror (well, almost)...

Checking into Rehab

2010-08-31T09:24:00.000-07:00

*Deep Breath*

This isn't something I've shared with (m)any people, let alone post this on the internet for the world to see (ie. a world of both of you). There is an element of ease while writing this, as I don't have to look at anyone in the eye, and admit I have a problem. But, that still doesn't mean this is easy. It takes a real man (as opposed to a fake one) to admit he has a problem, and needs to seek professional help.

Finally, after way too long, I've checked myself into Rehab.

Life was simply becoming too much without it anymore. I was constantly waking up miserable, and people around me said that I seemed on edge all the time (and of course, my reaction was "F#%k off"). "They don't know the pain I'm going through right now" I'd tell myself, and shun them off. I'd get concerned looks, but I could care less. For those that really cared, would ask me to talk about my problems. "Talk about my problems?" I'd think, "What, is that for guys don't eat salads who don't wear spandex?". The lack of summer here in (coastal) San Diego was really depressing me. I simply couldn't take it.

I needed a therapist, so I checked into Rehab United to set myself straight.

Physical therapy people - I miss riding my damn bike! (and running too)

Ok, enough drama (most of the above is not actually true). Seriously speaking, I started physical therapy at Rehab United last week, and things are going as well as they could be after a week. Apparently, the extremely tight hips I have may be causing the misalignment. We'll see in due time. I am excited to be working with these people, as I've heard nothing but great things about them and what they do.

Also, as head coach, I decided it was time to get back to running and biking (screw that swimming crap for now!), and took my roadie out on the roads on Laguna mountain this past Saturday (more on that in a bit)! It was freaking great. All knee issues are no longer, and the endorphins were flowing. One thing I certainly "learned" - I love riding my bike. I'm sure you're thinking "Uh duh dude, you've done RAAM twice". But seriously, even though I have nothing on the calendar, I definitely missed turning the pedals. Very rarely in the past five years have I ridden a bike without training for something. Now I do it for (gasp) fun! I realized the other day that if there was one workout I enjoy the most, it's those 4-5 hour bike rides - especially when I'm FIT. Assuming PT goes well, I should hopefully be only a few months away from ripping up the roads.

The time off was actually good for me (as Evan pointed out) mentally. I was totally bummed about not being to do Cozumel, but admittedly, the break from rushing from bed-to-workout-to-work-to-workout-back-to-work-then-maybe-to-a-3rd-workout was certainly welcomed.

I'm refreshed and STOKED!

ps- Chuckie V has finally been updating his blog. I don't know about you, but there is a sense of calmness and "all that is right with the world" when he graces us with his words.

pps- Thanks for all the positives comments from my last blog post.

ppps- good little jam right here:

Shutting it down

2010-08-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

Warning! Not a fun post.

I will be taking a little break from training & racing.

Back when I was dealing with my knee issues in May & June, CV mentioned that I should check into any Leg Length Discrepancies (LLD) to see if that is part of the cause for the ITBS. It was a good idea, and the research I did mentioned that an LLD can cause ITBS, and low back discomfort - which I have had for about 7 years. It made me think that I should look at fixing any issues on a macro level, rather than just one area (ie. knee, or hips). This might have been the reason (or maybe the cause) as to why I have had this "pelvic twist" "issue" for years, which is what I went to PT for a few years back. Ultimately, I became focused on finding out the root cause for this misalignment for the main reasons of reducing the risk of injury long term, along with not having to deal with back discomfort on a day to day basis.

Finally, after RAAM, I started the investigation into the LLD thing, and I had 2 x-ray Rx's from 2 different doctors (long story). I figured an LLD x-ray Rx from one doctor would be the same as an LLD x-ray Rx from another doctor, right? Wrong.

Well, after speaking with both doctor's, I have two doctors who think they can help, one doctor who thinks the other is incompetent, an LLD that is at least .25", but maybe more, an argument as to why .25" is both significant and insignificant, no answer to the root cause of my problem, a combination of things that may make up a solution that might work, a boatload more confusion, and a frustration level that is so high, I have almost grown numb to it.

I can't kick off the wall in the pool without feeling discomfort in my back. I can't swim a stroke with my left arm without feeling discomfort in my left shoulder. I can't bike because I developed chondromalacia during RAAM. I can run, but I run scared because I am not sure if my ITBS / Bursitis is still "there". It doesn't hurt fortunately, but I can also tell something isn't right.

I am in no shape to start training for an Ironman again. "Wait, what?" Yeah, well, after IMSG, I believed in myself and my abilities to qualify for the big dance, and CV agreed. With me aging up next year to M3034, there is no way I want to compete with the likes of these guys for a slot, so I said that the goal should be to qualify this year, not to mention, I was fired up and motivated. With all North America Ironman's being sold out (shocker), the only one left in the western hemisphere was Ironman Cozumel. My good buddy Greg also signed up for IM Cozumel because he was so inspired by watching all of us at IMSG. I was stoked - finally, someone to train with! So, during the early parts of finding out I had ITBS, CV and I figured I had the standard run-of-the-mill nothing-special ITBS, that I would recover soon, and after a little post-RAAM recovery, I'd be ready to rock it in prep for Cozumel, so I dropped the six hundo on registration, only to have all of this backfire.

So, I am shutting the swim, bike, run stuff down for a while, and am devoting 100% of my energies towards finding out the root cause(s) of these issue(s) I have. Honestly, I think once we figure out the root cause of the hip misalignment - I think everything else will fall into place - literally, and figuratively. Unfortunately, this isn't going to be easy, fast, or probably cheap, I'm certain. Ultimately, I just want someone to tell me the root cause of why I am misaligned (muscle imbalance? LLD? muscle tightness? skeletal something?) and put me on a path to fixing it long term. Simple, not easy.

Suggestions, especially from those in San Diego, are certainly welcome.

ps- ART is a (strong) possibility, and I don't believe in chiropractic care being a long term solution.

60 minute FTP

2010-07-09T10:00:00.000-07:00

The weekend after RAAM, I enlisted the help of one of my RAAM teammates, Andrew Danly, to join me for a fun, little 60 minute FTP test (read: 60 minute all out) around Fiesta (Feces) Island. Andrew is about the only one crazy to join me for such a suffer one week after finishing RAAM, so it was only natural to ask him (and him only). Andrew is also stronger than me on the bike (since he doesn't "waste" his time swimming or running), so sometimes it would help to know that one tenacious cyclist was sucking wheel, or that sometimes he would jump out in front to give me a carrot to chase. Chuckie also mentioned "Just have him yell like a mother-f&%ker, doing whatever it takes to motivate you. If silence works best, that'll do too. Music is my motor. White Zombie is always worth 10 watts." Noted.

The main driver for this nonsense was to get some post-RAAM data (Yes, I'm a nerd), share war stories from the week, and maybe to annihilate some unsuspecting bikers on the island. I was in total cyclist henchman mode - not a triathlete for the morning (and annihilate bikers, we did).

I have never done a 60 minute all out effort like this before, so I setup a playlist to keep me amped the entire way. Here's what it was, in order (I'm sure my boy Rob will appreciate half of these):

Justice - D.A.N.C.E.
Matisyahu w/ Crystal Method: Drown in the now
Justice - DVNO
DMX - Up in here
Eminem - Run Rabbit Run
Mgmt - Kids
Eminem - till I collapse
Justice - Genesis
Redman - Let's get dirty
The Darkness - Givin Up
TV on the radio - wolf like me
Outkast - Bombs over baghdad
White Zombie - More Human than Human
Rob Zombie - Dragula

I also figured since I was going to go as hard as I could go, I might as go as fast as I can go, and opted for the skinsuit, aero helmet, and left the 404 on the front.

I got in a warm up that, in hindsight, wasn't long enough, and then started the test. About 10 minutes in, I realized that I was going too hard (~178HR), and my lungs were absolutely on fire. Knowing I had 50 minutes left, I backed off a bit, and learned that there is such a huge difference between 171 and 174HR for me. About 25 minutes in, I fell into a rhythm, and settled in around ~175HR, and steadily increased to about 181 towards the end of the test. It's funny how 178 can be gut wrenching at one point, then 30-40 minutes later, 178 feels "good". With this being my first FTP, I think my pacing could certainly be better, and will be noted for next time. The only other issue with the test is the motorhome who was in front of me taking up the entire road, which made me stop pedaling for a little bit, as you can see in the nerd pic below:

At any rate, the final data was:

26.1 mph (Avg)
87 rpm (Avg)
177HR (Avg; my max is ~185HR, but I don't place much stock in a max HR)
258W (Avg)
259W (normalized)

At 150 lbs, the magical W/Kg ratio is 3.79.

So, what does this all mean?

Not sure really, since I don't have much to compare it to since I have never done a 60 min FTP on a flat course. Does that put me in the stud category with Evan? Could I power all the electronics in my living room to watch le tour in full surround sound? Is there any correlation with 3.79 W/Kg and those AG'ers who qualify for Kona? I do know that its a slightly higher than Marty Taylor, so I'll take it!

I did do a time trial up Palomar's East Grade the week before RAAM last year, and had the following numbers:

11.1 miles (~5%)
296W
51m33s (to the fire station)
177HR

I know that someone is generally going to put out more watts going uphill rather than on a flat, so it's hard to compare the McIntosh apples (my favorite) to Valencia Oranges.

Andrew brought along his flip video thing, as he normally does, and took some footage. I asked him to send it to me, but he took it upon himself to make a video from prior footage as well. Probably my favorite part is the beginning, where I am barreling around out of an SUV, stumbling around like I just finished racing my bike across the country (b/c I just did):

As an aside, check out Andrew's Blog for his write up on RAAM. He has a very interesting perspective on the race with a unique writing style, and goes into much more detail than I. His post might take me 5-10 minutes to read, but it's very good, and his last one had me laughing in tears, talking about the name of our truck in RAAM being DH1 - as in, Dildo Holster 1. Ass.

Post Race Stuff

2010-06-30T12:00:00.000-07:00

I just wrote thousands of words (about 8 grand) to describe the Race Across America from my perspective. Sometimes those words come easy, and sometimes I know that whatever I type, it simply doesn't do the justice. I wish that everyone could experience something like RAAM. It's just so frekkin cool!

Everyone has asked me how it compared to last year. It's hard to say - last year was my first year, and everything was new. This year, I tried to improve upon what I did last year, and I also rode a different shift, despite their being overlap between my shift this year, and my shift last year. This year meant more in a way because of the challenges I had just getting to the start line, and the challenges we had during the race with Tobias. But also too, I knew that I gave it my absolute all this year, mentally and physically, and had more fun in a way because I knew I wanted to enjoy & document it a little more.

Was it a success?

We were faster this year, by a whole .01mph / 44 minutes. At first, this is a little disappointing since we were a much stronger team than last year. But, it was a different course this year, arguably more challenging because we stayed in Colorado for some more climbing, as opposed to dropping down into New Mexico. Although staying in CO is less miles to travel south to NM, RAAM also added a 50 mile stretch in AZ that wasn't there last year.

Also, even though TT1 beat us, they beat us by less this year, 4h15m, as opposed to 7h last year.

Then there is the minutia of comparing time station data from 2009 and 2010.

When Tobias was feeling good, all I know is that TT1 and us held each other to within a few minutes. Sometimes we beat them, sometimes we beat them, but it was never by more than 5 minutes.

Team4Mil

Like I said before, it was great having Team4Mil so close for the first third of the race. This brought a nice element of actual racing that was a lot of fun. Their team captain was interviewed by the durango herald, and he said this:

"We were doing a fine job," he said. "We were right on the verge of catching the second-place team, and we were probably 45 minutes from catching the first-place team, which previously set a course record."

Yes, 4Mil was definitely doing a fine job, but there wasn't a chance in hell that they would have caught us, or TT1 (Even James Stout from TT1 thought the same). When J&A handed off to us in AZ, we had a 3 minute lead, and when Tobias and I were done, we put 15 minutes into them. Larry & Kevin, then Brad &John continued to do the same. But that's OK, because I like it when people talk trash through the web, just as TT1 did a few times.

Communication

Communication during RAAM is comedic. Andrew and I would text about shift changes sometimes. At a shift exchange, sometimes we would converse, sometimes we wouldn't. Then, Tobias and I would talk through Dave when on shift. When we should do a shift exchange with Larry & Kevin, again, sometimes we would talk, sometimes we wouldn't. Then with Brad & John, we conversed more via facebook than anything. Hell, when we parted ways in O'side, we said "See ya in Annapolis" because that's really the next time we would!

Numbers

3005 miles
100,000+ ft of elevation gain
54 time stations
Apx. 700,000 pedal strokes
12 states
7GB worth of pics and videos
Lifetime of memories

Course Profile

Ever wondered what the course profile is for RAAM?

Recovery

The race is basically 5.5 days / 400 miles of threshold work for me (A "crash" block in Joe Friel speak). My legs felt like they could have pedaled through a brick wall about 3 days after the race - bulletproof. It's a great feeling let me tell you! Recovery is actually very easy - just sleep as much as possible for as long as it takes.

Swimming?

Back when my knee was acting up, I wasn't cycling everyday, and I sure wasn't running. So, to get some exercise, I was swimming quite a bit. Chuckie (half jokingly) called me "the fastest swimmer ever to do RAAM", telling me that no one shows up to Le Tour bragging about 10K swim weeks! We laughed at it then, I still laugh at it now.

The Team

We had a great team this year, all of whom have bios here. They are:

Jeremy "Toro" Gustin
Andrew "Metal" Danly
Tobias "Turbo" Panek
Me
Larry "The Godfather" Bice
Kevin "Quasimoto" Hunter
John "Tynee" Tyner
Brad "Gorilla" Exmeyer

I can't thank these guys enough for being my teammates. A big thanks goes to Kevin for giving me the final push to be "in" for this, and for having my back when my knee was troublesome.

The Crew

Without our incredible crew (funny bios) none of these would be remotely possible. A big thanks to Dave our driver.

Finally

Talking about RAAM, especially with those who have done it this year and last, never gets old.

Would I do it again? If we could ride to win, WITHOUT A DOUBT.

The finish line

2010-06-29T12:00:00.000-07:00

Although the race ends at the dock, all racers must stop at a shell station to get an escort from an official. I had about 4 hours to kill between our last shift and the escort, so I checked into the hotel, showered, continued not shaving for an entire week, got some food, and went over.

My tank was seriously emptied. I half jokingly said that if the car goes over 15mph, I would get dropped! It was all small chain ring soft pedaling for the 4.2 miles to the dock.

Officially at the finish line:

Cyclists making fun of a triathlete and an aerobar water bottle holder:

Like I said - "The only thing that is less spectacular than the start is the finish." You be the judge:

Starting line crowd:

Finish line crowd - our crew:

There's no cheering fans, no stadium seating, none of that. Again, its the anti-Ironman / triathlon, and I kinda like that. There's a few race officials, your team's crew, and maybe a few random people walking around.

For us, it was a little different since Team4Mil, who dropped out of the race because one of their crew members fell asleep driving their RV and crew/riders sustained injuries, came to watch us finish. I thought this was really cool because we were neck and neck for a about the first third of the race. We all shook hands, and it was great to see them.

However, it wasn't all cool. When teams finish, they stand up on stage, say a few things, get medals, and then leave the stage. RAAM wanted Team4Mil to get up on stage with us, and their team captain had the mic, and said some things. Some of the things he said were good, things like "spirit of competition" and such, and how they look forward to racing against us next year.

But you know what, get off the stage. Give us our 10 minutes of glory on our own stage, and maybe address us from below, or when we are off stage. Don't steal our thunder. But, more on this in the next post.

We were all a little like "huh?", but got over it pretty quickly, signed the RAAM banner, and went back to the hotel to take the stickers off the trucks! Yeah, there is no glamour after finishing RAAM - back to work! We all hung out drinking beers, cleaning up the trucks (some more than others), finally got some food and drank more beers, then I passed out for a while. I got up later, got more food and drank more beers, and finally passed out for good. Let me tell you - post-RAAM sleep is hands down the best sleep anyone could get!

This cheer took lots of energy, trust me:

The next post is the final one (finally)...

Shift #7: WV/MD Border to just past Gettysburg

2010-06-28T12:00:00.001-07:00

After we handed it off to Larry and Kevin, we headed east through West Virginia, and stayed just over the border in Hancock, Maryland. We checked into our hotel at about 2pm to rest up for our final shift at 11pm EDT. This was essentially the calm before the storm.

I didn't sleep much, but I did rest a lot. In the 4 hours before the shift, I put down two plates of brown rice pasta dishes I brought to top off the tanks and be ready for battle. We met A&J promptly at 11, and Tobias took the first pull. It was now officially time to empty the tank.

Jeremy and Andrew, our fastest guys and best climbers, opted to help us out on this one hill we were on, each doing an additional pull after their 5 hour shift was finished. I felt like I wanted to pay it forward to Larry and Kevin, but didn't want to make that public in the event that I couldn't.

The shift was generally fun since it was at night, and I felt like I was climbing much better than I was doing on the flats. The flats just HURT, whereas I had no problem taking a 700ft climb in the middle of the shift. Michelle and Desi joined us for part of our shift, and as much as you are sick of seeing pictures of me riding, I am posting this one to remind Dave and Michelle that they almost got themselves killed taking it!

Most of this shift was flat, and I revisited something on this shift that I did "randomly" last year, and on Ohio. As I was cranking along on the flats, everything just hurt, but I refused to let up the pace/effort. I eventually "boiled over" and just screamed - out in the middle of nowhere, at no one. I ended up asking Wei about it after the race, if he ever just heard me yell. He said Yeah, and the FV always wondered what was going on with me. "Pain - get ready for it next year" I told him.

As time went on, we went through gettysburg, and sunlight started to show towards the end of our shift at 4am. Tobias did a long pull as his last one, and while I was waiting, Larry and Kevin drove by, saying they were going to meet us up the road.

I had been pacing myself accordingly throughout the shift to have the tank completely empty, and I knew I had one last pull to end my RAAM, possibly forever. I asked Larry to only go 2 miles up the road, but by that time, they were already 4 miles up. I know I had to dig, since this 4 mile pull was going to hurt like no other.

TIME TO EMPTY THE TANK.

Tobias got to the intersection, gave some words of encouragement, and off I went. Oh, it hurt so bad, but felt so good. When you are hurting this bad, everything hurts, and after every pedal stroke, you are just praying that you will see their car around the next corner. Finally, I saw their blinking lights, and completely unleashed everything I had. I came roaring up to their car at about 32mph, and because night exchanges have to happen in the headlights of a car, immediately slammed on the brakes. It took me about 30 seconds of heavy breathing and not moving before I could even swing the leg over the bike and walk it back , and I knew there was no way I could help them out in their shift.

I had finally done something everyone talks about, and something I have never done - completely emptied the tank. I didn't have one more pedal stroke in me at that time. It was a great feeling to know that I gave it MY ALL, and that I have NOTHING left to give. I got in our truck, and we headed towards Annapolis for the finish line escort. The work was done.

Shift #6: Ohio

2010-06-28T12:00:00.000-07:00

The drive from MO to OH was kind of a blur, I don't remember anything significant happening during the ride. All I knew was that I was really tired, and that we were driving to OH, so I tried to get a lot of shut eye in the back of the truck. If I remember correctly, I think I did a good job in doing so (can ya tell fatigue was settling in?). I was kind of excited because our next shift in OH was from 2am - 7am and I dig riding at night. Honestly, I don't remember where we stayed in OH, or much about the hotel. We were approaching the final stretch, and just like last year, things started getting blurry.

The first few hours were fairly uneventful (I think), with rolling hills, and dropping temperatures.

As the sun was starting to come up, it was revealing the layers of fog that we could only see with the FV headlights. This was a pretty cool part of the shift because it was a flat to rolling "course", and you would go in and out of the fog banks. Really neat stuff. This pic doesn't do proper justice, but trust me, rolling through a fog bank with nothing but the FV headlights, and the slightest of glows from the sun is pretty cool!

The shift was kind of fun , and it was a shift I was looking forward to because of riding at sunrise. Last year, I looked forward to the "sunrise shift" because while a lot of people were hitting their snooze bars and wondering how many cups of coffee they were gonna need to wake up, I was riding my bike in the Race Across America. Bad ass. This is the stuff that keeps me ticking, but that is a whole other post by itself.

About 90 minutes later, Dave snapped this great picture of Tobias and I right after an exchange.

With the sun right over the horizon, I looked over just in time to catch it there and started thinking about how lucky I am in life to have the abilities and opportunities to do this. Few people are blessed with the physical and mental abilities to do this, along with the external support from sponsors. My good friend, and arguably one of the coolest dudes on the planet, Homa, told me before the race to enjoy this once in a lifetime experience. He then corrected himself: twice in a lifetime. It is seriously times like this where I feel life is being lived. I am truly lucky.

I got in the truck, and Dave and I drove about half a mile, and HAD to stop over to take this pic:

One exchange hour later - still lovin:

A little bit, those deep, philosophical thoughts were wiped away with reality, and it might have been one of the funniest parts of the race.

There was a detour from the route book, and a lot of confusion. Long story short, I just did a 5 mile pull, Tobias & the FV got lost, and 2 minutes later, I was put back on course so we didn't lose any time. As I approached a small hill, off to the left I started hearing dogs bark. I didn't think much of it because even if the dogs weren't on a leash, this person had a huge yard, and there was no way they were going to catch me.

What I didn't realize is that a little hill was blocking my view because when I crested, there was a pitbull coming at me in an ALL OUT SPRINT barking ferociously. Let me tell you I dropped the proverbial hammer like my life depended on it, because I think it did! I would have loved to have a power meter on the bike to see how many times over my power multiplied.

Right before he got to the road, the dog slammed on his brakes so hard that he actually kicked dirt into the road. It was surprising that he stopped so sudden (but maybe b/c he know he didn't have a chance catching me ;) I looked back at the FV, and was all smiles and laughing at this situation. I later learned that the FV actually swerved towards the dog (protect the rider at all costs) - thank god!!! I crested the hill nearly in tears from laughing, and when Dave picked me up, he was like "Uh, why were you laughing so hard?!"

I told Dave to put Tobias out there for 6-7 miles since he was close to feeling 100%, and I was starting to get pretty cooked. Well, when we went to pick him up at about mile 7, I looked at my bike to get on it, and SOB, I had my 4th flat (3rd on the rear). F! I realized this as Tobias was closing in at 200 yards at about 25mph, so I had to tell him to keep going. Honestly, I didn't feel bad because I had shouldered the load for the past 3 shifts, and he had arguably the freshest legs in the damn race!

The rest of the shift was all about digging deep to hand off to Larry and Kevin so that they could continue our fast pace through Ohio (despite a few navigational miscues).

Shift #5: Across the Mississippi

2010-06-27T14:56:00.000-07:00

I normally like to get up 2-3 hours before a shift so I have time to wake up a bit, have some coffee, real/solid food, and to mentally prepare myself for the onslaught that is a 5 hour RAAM shift. With the numerous bathroom stops the day prior, this cut into sleep time, and at best, I was looking at about 3.5 hours. I decided to wake up about 1h45m before the shift start instead, so I set the alarm accordingly. Well, even during RAAM is the snooze bar my friend. I hit it a few times without even realizing it, and then I had a holy sh!t moment when I realized it was already an hour before our shift started. I jumped out of bed, and starting running around like a mad man trying to prepare everything. Fortunately, I did a lot of that stuff the night prior, but still, I was in a frenzy.

After the dust settled, I was still barely awake. My eyes were about halfway open. We were probably going to be late by a few minutes to take over from J&A (never cool). But the worst part was that we were riding at rush hour. Here's why riding at rush hour absolutely sucks:

* The roads we were riding on were single lane roads (each side), where cars still drive about 60mph
* Riding at rush hour (6am at the time) means that teams need to follow night rules, meaning the rider needs to stay within the headlights of the follow vehicle. This isn't so much of a problem, except:
* On these single lane roads, the follow vehicle is moving along much slower than how traffic would like to move
* Now that we are east of CA/AZ/CO, drivers REALLY don't like cyclists
* There is a RAAM rule that states that if a follow vehicle is seriously impeding the flow of traffic, then the vehicle AND rider must pull over to let traffic pass
* It was pretty foggy

So, here I was, groggy, cranky, with lots of angry drivers behind us. Recipe for disaster.

I think I was on my second pull, and I was going up a roller at about 13mph. I had no visibility into the traffic building up behind me, but the follow vehicle did. So, as I am climbing this hill, one of the guys in the FV pulls out the bullhorn and yells "RYAN"

It scared the crap out of me! I instinctively just yelled back "WHAT!?" and immediately came to a stop. I was totally shell shocked. It reminded me of a father yelling his kids name to scold him because it was just so damn BOOMY. Wei (crew member), told me to keep going, but to pull over at the first place I was able to to let traffic pass. What Wei didn't realize is that I was half asleep still, cranky, that there was no wind to prevent me from hearing him, and that the volume on the bullhorn was too loud. We eventually got to a stop sign, and I let him know to back off a bit!

We eventually got out of town, and into the corn fields. By this time, I was awake, not cranky, and ready to rip the flats, and rip the flats I did! I was in a much better place now, and like I said before, I love crankin on them!

Digging deep to keep it above 30mph:

A quick shot out to DeSoto Sport, one of our sponsors. I was one of 4 ViaSat racers who used the arm coolers, and let me tell you, they are THE REAL DEAL. These things definitely work really well when its hot out. In a way I was shocked at how well they work, but in a way I wasn't since everything DeSoto makes is top notch.

As we exited the corn fields, it was time to cross the Missippi, and I wanted the 7 mile pull. About 1 mile into it, I got my third flat of the race on the same wheel (rear). Fortunately, the follow vehicle was right behind me, and I quickly got out, and grabbed a spare wheel, and kept on going. As I approached an intersection, the light turned yellow, but since it was daytime, I could ride ahead without needing to be in the FV headlights. I was hammering along on the side of the road when I just couldn't navigate through the minefield of road debris, and got a flat on my front wheel. F! 2 flats in one pull! WTF! Since the follow vehicle was back stuck at the red light, I had to sit on the side of the road and wait for them to get *another* spare wheel.

I eventually crossed the great Mississippi, and handed it off to Tobias. The Mississippi marks the unofficial start to racing, and I was officially starting to get a little tired. We had an hour left in our shift, and I couldn't feel happier.

Shift #4: Pratt, KS to 10 mi past El Dorado, KS

2010-06-26T12:00:00.000-07:00

After navigating through a gnarly rain storm, we arrived in Pratt, Kansas around 2-3am. I realized that this was the hotel Larry and I stayed in last year in Kansas as group #3. But wait, as group 2 we would be riding about the same area as I did in Group 3 last year? This means we are already hours faster than we were last year. SWEET.

Tobias still wasn't feeling all that great and was still unable to keep in anything liquid or solid. Shift #3 was basically a recovery day for him, and it was appearing that shift #4 would be the same.

As usual, we underestimated Jeremy and Andrew, and they shot past our hotel, but we still started our shift on time. Unlike last year where it was 105 degrees with 100% humidity for third shift, it was only 85 degrees with 90% humidity for us riding 10am-3pm local time.

That doesn't mean it was "cold" though. In true nerd fashion, I was using the angled A/C vents to point right into my helmet when I was in the truck b/c it was too much of a pain to take it off and put it back on all the time:

I knew Tobias wasn't feeling well, and with the flat roads we had on this shift, I had no problem shouldering the load again. Unlike most people, I frekkin love riding my TT bike, and I love riding in the TT position. I am about the only person I know that enjoys riding in the aerobars for 5 hours at a time. Now, put me on terrain where I get to HAMMER in the aero position on flat roads? Word.

One little hazard about Kansas is the kamikaze bugs. Every once in a while, one would hit me in the chest or helmet, and it would literally feel like someone was hitting me with a rock! After getting beat up on one pull, I was telling Dave about it, and not one second after I finished, a kamikaze flew right into our windshield, where he stayed for the rest of the trip:

No offense to anyone from Kansas reading this blog, but there isn't much to see here. It's flat, there's lots of corn, and that's about it. I'm not gonna lie - the shift was relatively boring.

The highlight of the shift was when I was did a 30 minute pull. We were supposed to do an exchange right at a turn so that I wouldn't get lost, but unfortunately due to a course detour, Tobias and Dave weren't at the turn, so I was relying on the follow vehicle to guide me. I was out there for about 20 minutes (long by our standards), when I realized that something must have happened. I figured they made a wrong turn and got lost. Hey, it's a 3,000 mile race - this stuff happens. But, surprisingly, I was cool with that because I was firing on all cylinders, and then some. The follow vehicle was calling me a rock star through the bull horn, and I was lighting up the town of Maize KS (original, huh?). I was having an absolute blast! Eventually, Tobias and Dave drove past me, and Tobias stuck his head out the window and said "Hey, we got you a cheeseburger!" I wasn't really sure how to respond, but I was ready to get off the bike! They finally drove up far enough and we did the exchange. Dave said Tobias wasn't feeling well, and had to stop and use the restroom. He also confirmed the cheeseburger was for me. Being very lactose intolerant, consuming cheese in that weather would have put me in the same spot as Tobias, so I passed on it. The rest of the shift went really well - blazing through the corn fields and highways of Kansas.

After the shift, I did my normal recovery stuff:

* Take a "shower" using baby wipes in the backseat
* Consume premade bags of whey protein and amino acids with some high glycemic carbs
* Throw on compression pants
* Ice my left knee
* Stretch my legs
* Elevate my legs
* Self Massage

Being in the nosebleed (3rd) seat of our suburban, this is what a third of RAAM (basically, the driving portion of an off shift) looked like for me:

When I would feel a little saucy, I would really stretch out my legs to the roof:

It's a good thing a 5 hour shift can take a lot of you, or else I'd actually be bored!

Now, riding in the heat and humidity of Kansas, one would need to take some additional salt during a shift, which I did. But after the shift and my normal recovery stuff, I opened up a liter of V8. 5 minutes later, I killed the entire thing! DAMN! I guess I didn't take in nearly enough salt during the shift...

We stopped at a grocery store about an hour after the shift to get some food. Dave made his way to the deli portion of the store, and tried ordering a few things from the menu. Unfortunately, he was denied every time ("we don't have that"). So, he mulled it for another moment, and then asked "Do you have anything that isn't fried?" It literally took the woman about 10 seconds to respond, and all she had was a taco salad. This was the first instance of many where I said "We aren't in California anymore".

Here we are, looking like old men, hanging outside of the local store, eating, and watching the world go by:

Tobias was still feeling like crap, and we were stopping literally about every 30 minutes for him to use the bathroom. A few hours later, we stopped at a walmart for more food, and I finally suggested that we find a hospital for him. Everyone agreed. We tried stopping at a few ER's along the way to Missouri, but all were kind of crowded. We made the decision that the best course of action would be for Dave to bring him to a hospital at our destination (Washington, MO). It would be around Midnight, and there should be significantly less people waiting for doctors at that point. It proved to be a sound decision, since Tobias was treated immediately with 2 bags of IV.

The doctors realized that he had a stomach flu. After speaking with his wife, he learned that a bunch of people on their street had the same thing. Lesson learned: fence yourself off from society before any kind of race - especially RAAM!

Shift #3: Alamosa, CO to (Almost) Trinidad, CO

2010-06-25T12:00:00.000-07:00

We stayed in South Fork Colorado (I like calling it sofoco) that "night", around the area where we expected to pick up Jeremy and Andrew. I got in some solid sleep (by RAAM standards), and I woke up around 1000am (early) for our 2pm shift so I could grab some breakfast.

When I came back to the room, Tobias was mentioning that he felt like he needed to vomit, and was asking me if he should - not exactly the question I would have expected (despite having to expected the unexpected) to answer. I told him that's what he should feel like that during a shift (from riding so hard)- not before or after! He kept saying his stomach was acidic, and and made the executive call to go for it. I grabbed him some V8 (alkaline liquid) and some antacids to help calm in stomach. Without going into detail, he was much worse off than just vomiting - he simply couldn't absorb/keep in any liquid or solid food. The V8 and antacids, were helping a little, and he said he was feeling somewhat better. I was mildly relieved.

Andrew and Jeremy flew by our hotel (literally) earlier than expected (as usual), so we packed up the truck and got on our way.

While we were on our way to catch Jeremy and Andrew, I noticed Team4Mil looked like they dropped a few hours behind. I figured either something happened, or RAAM hadn't updated their website yet. I didn't think much of it at the time, but I will talk about this later.

On the look out and all ready to go whenever we see them:

We took over from Jeremy and Andrew just past Alamosa, CO, and I was ready to rock. The first 60 miles of this shift were on arguably the flattest roads of the course, with a rockin' tailwind.

With racers going at maximal effort on every pull, the first pull is always one of the hardest because you have been at rest for 15 hours, then all the sudden you just blast out on the bike. Having a tailwind seemed to help ease into things.

Southern Colorado may flat, but has many 14'ers within sight:

A couple hours into the shift, Dave was telling me that Tobias was feeling like crap. This is one weird thing about RAAM: despite Tobias and I being riding partners, we never talk to each other during a shift - we always talk through Dave. I was feeling good, so I told Dave that I could shoulder some of the load for now.

Shortly up the road was the La Veta pass, peaking at 9,300ft. I let Tobias get the downhill to the start of the climb, and I said I would get the 5 mile / 1,500 ft pass myself. Normally, this is horribly in efficient to let one rider take that much at once. Ideally, we would have split the 5 miles up into 1 mile intervals to maximize speed, but with a warrior not firing completely, I took it on.

I opted for my new road bike on the climb to crush it...

... and descended down the other side.

Last year, I did all of RAAM on just a TT bike, and never really felt like I was at a major disadvantage. But then again, the third group barely gets any climbing. This year on the second group, I wanted to bring a road bike to my arsenal, and having it for this climb and descent was almost worth it alone (that, and the fact that I felt more like a "roadie" - gasp!)

When I handed it off to Tobias near the end of the downhill, I WAS CHARGED UP!!! There is a pretty funny video of my reaction (that our media crew is editing) that I will have to post once it's completed. I was feeling on top of the world.

There was another exchange with Tobias, I took another downhill, and took the right towards La Veta, where I continued to fly downhill. Just another amazing view of a few 14,000ft peaks in Colorado:

I got into this little village, took a left, and all the sudden, I heard the follow vehicle honking at me. We missed a turn about a quarter mile back (the clock is still ticking), and just like that, my mood went from great to pissed. I was cursing anything and everything, but chilled out after a few minutes. Grrr....

The next hour was tough. It was raining with the occasional sleet, cold, windy, and the wrong turn just took the wind out of my sails. We were approaching our second climb, La Cuchara pass at 9,937 ft, and I knew it was time to let go of the wrong turn, and crush this climb. Tobias was still feeling like crap, so Dave and I were strategizing on where to do rider exchanges to make it easy on Tobias:

I told him I'd take the majority of this climb again.

An exchange - you can see how unhappy T looks:

AMPED halfway up the climb!

Having a little fun seeing where we just came from:

In case you're wondering...

Crushing Cuchara near the 9,937ft summit - it really is that beautiful out there...

and about to hit the top:

There was one long ass descent after this climb. Tobias and I did a few more exchanges, and we handed it off to Larry and Kevin. One of the few times you get to talk to someone outside of your truck:

With Tobias firing on a few cylinders, our times against TT1 didn't really fair well (8 minutes at one Time Station, and a whopping 29 minutes at the next), but it happens.

I was so glad that I had a road bike for this shift. The climbing was awesome, and the elevation and descents were epic. Fortunately, I didn't really feel the effects of being near 10,000 ft at all.

This was also the shift I was looking forward to the most. Most people know how beautiful Colorado is, but I never saw it last year because I was riding in the dark, bonking, and sleeping. I wanted a piece of the Rockies last year, but they really got a piece of me. This year, I wanted to crush them, and see how beautiful CO really is. I wasn't disappointed.

I took a few minutes after this shift to reflect on what just happened, and took this picture to remind myself:

Colorado is absolutely beautiful, and this picture, as much as it doesn't do the justice, is a good representation of CO (in my opinion). Green, undeveloped land, really tall mountains in the background, some clouds, and sun. Just absolutely beautiful. God's country.

I was also really happy with the shift. My riding partner was down, but not out. Despite having a knee injury that was still a little unknown, and not putting in the training I wanted to, I handled a tough shift very well - mentally and physically. The element of teamwork was at play, and I was diggin' it. This is part of what RAAM is all about!

We started making our way east towards Pratt Kansas after a quick stop in Trinidad for some food.

Sun falling over our machines in the back:

One gnarly ass rainstorm that we were about to drive through:

Sunset to a great day on the bike - I love this stuff!

Shift #2: Tuba City to the UT border

2010-06-24T12:00:00.000-07:00

**This might have been my favorite shift!**

With our 5 hour "on" / 15 hour "off" schedule, sleep and not rushing are luxuries. We don't know what we did, but somehow got record sleep, AND showed up about 90 minutes early to take over from Jeremy and Andrew (not that we actually took over from them early). So, I played media person #3, and got a few pics of the boys:

Good mix of blurriness and focus - kinda like riding at full throttle:

Snow covered mountains in the background:

We learned that while groups 3 & 4 were on course, them and Team 4Mil were leapfrogging and trading places for hours on end. When Jeremy and Andrew took over, they were behind, but they surprised no one when they made up time on them, and handed it back over to Tobias and I with a 3 minute lead. T and I knew what was up, and knew it was time to throw down and show these rookies how this works.

We had an absolute blast blazing through northern Arizona to the UT border. Our media crew, Michelle Valenti from Active.com, and Desi Klaar, multiple Ironman finisher, joined us for our shift, where we (mostly them) got absolutely killer pics:

Nerds with aero helmets in the car, lax before the shift start:

Accelerating on my first pull:

Long road through the Navajo Reservation:

No need to ask slowtwitch to critique my position ;)

The approach - check out those clouds - gods country out there in the Navajo Indian Reservation:

Hammering:

Rolling up the sleeves (actually, putting on arm warmers) to do work:

Game Face:

Tobias killing it:

Night exchange (7pm is "night" by RAAM rules, even though its still light out):

Towards the of the shift I was feeling like a rock star. I had a long downhill with a tailwind, and was just killin it! A RAAM media van came up next to me and had the camera rolling, and I absolutely dropped the hammer! I approached town so quickly, that Tobias and Dave weren't even ready for the rider exchange. So, they drove up the road to do another one, and again, I was too fast. Tobias did this to me few times too, but there are no hard feelings because it's a great "problem" to have.

I pulled the team across the UT border (yelling "Gimme two!", naturally), and 3 minutes later, I handed off to Kevin and Larry. We put 15 minutes into 4Mil alone on our shift (upping our lead to 18 minutes up on them), and didn't let TT1 put a second into us. Here are the average speeds from the time stations we rode through:

	ViaSat	4Mil	TT1
Mexican Hat, UT	24.34	24.12	24.34
Kayenta, AZ	23.55	22.56	23.55
Tuba City, AZ	27.08	26.09	27.08

WE DID WORK, AND WE WERE FIRED UP! There were 3 teams within an hour of each other at this point, and this race was unfolding much better than I could have imagined. I was feeling great, my knee was just as a good, and I was amped to hit the Rockies. BRING IT ON!

Shift #1: The CA Desert

2010-06-23T12:00:00.000-07:00

We picked up from Jeremy and Andrew somewhere around Brawley at 8pm. They were cooked, and gave it everything they had. Being 3 minutes down on TT1, and a few minutes up on Team 4Mil, I basically wanted to just maintain place and have fun because I wasn't sure how my knee would react to the violent pedaling. I also wasn't sure how the 2 of us would stack against the TT1 riders, but more on that later. We had TT1 in our sights for quite some time, until we hit some little town where we hit every red light. It wasn't long before TT1 was out of our physical sights, but we weren't worried. This is a 5 and a half day race!

In fact, our worries shifted quickly when we learned about an hour into our shift that our front right truck tire had a slow leak in it. Fortunately, our crew chief Chuck packed an air compressor in our follow vehicle, and we quickly grabbed it. Dave, our driver, handled this with grace. After every pull, Dave got out, and had the compressor going to keep the tire. Sometimes the PSI would increase, sometimes it wouldn't.

Expect the unexpected.

I was trying not to let it bother me because I was having FUN! We had a nice tailwind, with comfortable temps in the desert, and we were flyin'! I LOVE riding at night (during RAAM): it's something you never get to do in training, and there are very few cars on the road. Not to mention, it's the first shift, everyone is excited and has fresh legs. Very rarely in training do you get to just pedal without mercy while going 30mph (and not have to worry about turning around into the headwind!). It was a good shift where we probably averaged 25mph, and then handed off to Larry and Kevin. I don't remember where we handed it off, but it was somewhere near the AZ border.

We had a tire to fix, and fortunately, there was a 24-Hour Walmart open somewhere out in the middle of nowhere, and we got some fix-a-flat that allowed us to get to flagstaff. I passed out fairly quickly in the 3rd row seat of our suburban, and woke up at our destination, where I went right back to sleep in the hotel at 7am.

Pre-sleep #2 breakfast and recovery with beautiful sights in the background:

The start line to shift #1

2010-06-22T12:00:00.000-07:00

The only thing that is less spectacular than the start is the finish.

The Team, L-R:
Back/Short people row: Me (vertically challenged), Kevin Hunter, Andrew Danly, Larry Bice, John Tyner
Front/Tall people row: Tobias Panek, Jeremy Gustin, Brad Exmeyer

The start is a mess. Teams barely know what they are doing, the format changes year to year, and there is about 100 people there to watch, and half of them are the teams crews. It's basically hand waving for the camera, and then "see ya in a week!".

But I like that about this race. It's the anti-Ironman / triathlon. There is no nervous tension, 4am wake up calls, early morning grogginess, people running around asking for body glide, serious faces, people showing off, and everything else that you already know about.

So, we took pictures, waved our hands, did a little 6 mile ride as a team out the 76, and then got picked up, where Tobias and I were going to start our first shift at 8pm about 15 miles east of Borrego Springs.

I really like this picture of Larry (my riding partner from last year). Larry is solely responsible for ViaSat even being involved with RAAM, so any experience I have in RAAM, can be attributed to this man.

The drive out there was nothing spectacular - 4 dudes laughing, goofing, trying to one up each others' farts (arguably one of the most competitive parts of the race), talking strategy and all that road trip type of stuff. We got to our projected start place about 75 minutes ahead of time, and we slowly got ready to start our shift. I was checking the times, and Team ViaSat was in the lead by about 3 minutes at the first time station at Lake Henshaw. Sweet!

About 45 minutes before our shift started, I heard some guy come ROARING by with a disk wheel. He must have been going 35 mph. He was from Team Type 1, our biggest competitors. A mere 15 seconds later, Jeremy (our team) came BLASTING by at about the same speed.

HO-LEE SH!T

We are RACING ladies and gents, and all the sudden I got REAL nervous. IT WAS ON. But, we were also way behind we were supposed to start, so we got in the truck and floored it!

Sunset:

Andrew digging deep as we drove past him:

It was a little concerning because somehow TT1 made up over 3 minutes on us in 20 miles. I later found out that when Andrew hit the bottom of the glass elevator, his wheel came out from under him on some loose gravel, and he went down... hard:

8pm came around, and it was time to take over, with TT1 in sight. SH!T!

Why RAAM 2010 almost didn't happen for me

2010-06-21T12:00:00.000-07:00

** in the spirit of RAAM, this post is a little long because A LOT happened. There were quite a few times where I thought I wasn't even going to get to the start line. But, I persevered, and all the chaos set me up for a great mindset going into this **

So, when I developed that injury during Ironman St. George that was diagnosed as ITBS (with an emphasis on BS), I was told:

    * Cycling is fine and shouldn't bother the injury
    * It should take 3 weeks of treatments to heal it
    * Doing RAAM would be fine

Well, things didn't really work out that way. Here's what went down.

One month from the race

After a very easy 2 weeks post IMSG, I joined my teammates Larry and Kevin for a 90 mile ride up to Dana Point and back. It was a hard ride, but certainly within my capabilities. At about mile 80, the pain on the lateral side of the knee came back, so I took it easy on my way back home. I ended up canceling my Sunday ride, and was NOT a happy camper.

I gave my knee a few days rest, and did 8 hard hill repeats on Wednesday, followed by 6 on Thursday. Everything with the knee seemed to be fine, and life was good! Back on schedule...

2 weeks from the race

I did a four hour ride the next Saturday morning, with the slightest of irritation, and an easy 45 minute spin in the afternoon. Sunday morning, I did an hours worth of intervals on the trainer, and then Michelle and I headed out for an easy spin up to Carlsbad and back. About 30 minutes in, my knee started getting a little annoyed, and by about an hour in, it was more than "noticeable". 75 minutes in, I had to make the call to get off my bike because I was in so much pain and had to ask Michelle to finish the ride by herself so that she could come pick me up. I hung out on a bus stop bench for 90 minutes, reading the paper, working on my tan, and being really pissed off. I was 13 days away from riding my bike across the country at full throttle, and I couldn't even pedal it 12mph on a flat. Frustrated is a light way of describing how I felt. By the time Michelle arrived, I had already come to the conclusion that I wasn't going to be able to do RAAM, and was preparing for how I would approach our alternate rider to take my place.

Later that day, I emailed my PT, and his response, despite 3.5 weeks of PT, was that my ITBS "was acting as expected". WTF! As expected? As in, "normal"? I thought cycling was fine, doctor?

I spoke with Chuckie and then Angela about this, and they had some ideas. It was helpful to hear people who have dealt with these types of issues, but at the same point, there was conflicting evidence, and now I had more questions, so I decided to get an MRI to try and get some real answers. I spoke with my primary care physician that Tuesday, and he thought I had bursitis, so he prescribed me prednisone, which is a strong steroid and anti-inflammatory. I told my roommate Graham about it (who knows a thing or two about endurance sports and who happens to work for a pharmaceutical company), and he said I shouldn't take prednisone because it could "really mess me up", and that I should wait to get the MRI results and get a proper diagnosis. At this point, I had spoken to 3 people whom I trust, most of whom had different perspectives and opinions on the matter.

The next day, I met with an orthopedist, a guy who has done Kona 5 times (that was cool), and he said I probably have ITBS, but that an MRI would be the best bet to give the best answer, despite it not being 100% accurate. He recommended that I do just easy spinning until the race, and not push it all. I was able to get an MRI 8 days (Friday) before the race, but, because it takes 48 hours to process the images, I couldn't meet with him on Monday, and with him being in surgery on Tuesday, I couldn't meet with him until Wednesday - 3 days before the race start!! F!! I was a mess this an entire week and a half, coming to the conclusion 2 more times that I would, then wouldn't, be able to do RAAM.

7 days before

As the weekend approached, I still felt uneasy. The last time I biked, I couldn't pedal at 12mph, but when I thrashed myself up hills at LT time and time again, I felt fine. I realized that I needed to test the knee before the race. If I couldn't handle a weekend of training, there was no way I would be able to pedal 375+ miles violently for a week. So, saturday morning, I did TEN repeats up Torrey pines at LT. No issues with the knee before, during or after. I reviewed the power data after, and my avg output was no more than 1.5% less than it was 2 weeks before IMSG. "Hmm, cool"

The next day, I did it again - TEN more repeats up TP. Again, no issues with the knee before, during or after, nor was there any power decrease more than 1.5%. I was surprised, and cautiously optimistic at best.

(Yes, that's 20 repeats up the pines for the weekend. Trust me, I was happy just to be doing it. That, and I owned the hill those mornings).

I spoke to the team captain and told him that with my variable condition, if the team wanted to move forward with someone less "risky", then I wouldn't be offended. There was more at stake here than just me - I didn't want to let an entire team of 19, including crew, down. Kevin assured me that the team had my back, and I couldn't be more relieved.

3 days before

The orthopedist and I reviewed the MRI, and it was evident that I had ITBS, and bursitis. What I also learned was that ITBS is a general, all encompassing term that could include bursitis, but not necessarily (Side note: always ask lots of questions to doctors to get the real story, because you may not get what you need to hear the first or second time).

He said that if I do the race (and he recommended that I do it), there is little to no chance that I wouldn't do any long term damage, which was the biggest relief. Sweet!!! He prescribed some strong ibuprofen, told me to ice and stretch it, but that there is a greater than 50% chance of it flaring up during the race, and that I shouldn't get an anti-inflammatory injection (commonly known as cortisone, but he said depomedrol is better). He also recommended that I bring my MRI images with me on CD in case it does flare up, so that I could get an injection during the race. He wished me good luck, shook my hand, and like that, he was gone.

Here I was, 3 days before the race, and I finally felt somewhat, but not completely, confident that I could do RAAM.

2 days before

After thinking about it, something wasn't sitting well with me. I called him back the next day, and basically said "If you think there is greater than 50% chance of it flaring up, then wouldn't I be stupid NOT to get the damn shot before the race? Wouldn't that be better rather than being uneasy about it until it flares up, and then hoping that there would be a orthopedist somewhere in the middle of Kansas?" I thought my logic was so clear, and yet just couldn't understand why him and other medical professionals were saying NOT to get it. Yes, they know more than me, but none could give me a straight answer as to why I shouldn't.

There was a part of me that was scared to do the race because of what (bad things) might happen, but at the same point, I didn't want to NOT do the race. What might be even worse is watching the race from my desk at work the entire week, wondering "what if". Major cognitive dissonance.

I thought about it some more, and my perspective was that I needed to do EVERYTHING in my power to minimize the risk of something bad happening. I didn't want to be in the middle of nowhere with the closest orthopedist being 200 miles in the wrong direction letting myself and MY TEAM down. No way.

I called another doctor friend of mine and discussed this with him, and he basically said that it was already too late to get an injection, and not to bother. I thought my sails just lost their wind for the last time.

The day before (!!!)

I called the Orthopedist and said that I made my decision to get an injection for the exact reasons I laid out above. After bike inspection, I drove down, got it, and immediately felt more at ease (despite my knee feeling a little numb). He was totally cool with it, and I gave him our web address so that he could follow along. FINALLY, 24 hours from race start, I knew that I had done anything and everything to ensure that I could do this race (and tru$t me, I paid for it).

Damn

The last 13 days before the race were an absolute roller coaster. This was the type of stuff NO ONE should have to go through before such an event. I almost felt like getting to the start line was going to be harder than the race. When I was just about convinced that I wasn't going to be able to do it, I would tell myself that if I actually was able to do it - that no matter how much it sucked (because I knew there were going to be a really tough parts) that I should just be happy to be there.

So, that was my perspective going into the race: be happy to be there and to make the absolute most of it, because there may not be another RAAM, and that this one almost slipped away a few times. This was supposed to be the fastest team in our history, and the time has come to kick some ass and have some fun. Let's hope for the best!

So, I hope you enjoy my stories as I Race Across America with one fresh perspective...

2010 Race Across America

2010-06-19T17:24:00.000-07:00

I am still at a loss for words at what just happened. Stay tuned...

2010 Race Across America Info

2010-06-09T20:38:00.000-07:00

Here's the breakdown of how we will be documenting Team's ViaSat 2010 Race Across America in real time (literally):

Start time: Saturday, June 12th @ 2pm @ Oceanside pier. Come and watch!

The Main site with everything embedded in real time: www.viasat.com/raam

Team stuff:
Twitter: http://twitter.com/TeamViasat
Picasa (pictures): http://picasaweb.google.com/viasatracing
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/user/RAAMTeamViaSat
Blog: http://teamviasat-raam-2010.blogspot.com/

My stuff:
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ryancdenner
Picasa: http://picasaweb.google.com/ryan.denner/RAAM2010#

All of the above have RSS feeds if you want to add them to your RSS reader, and all are embedded onto the top of this blog.

Cool Factor

We won't be having the "live" video feed this year, but we will be using google latitude to keep you (and us) informed on where we are at any point in time! (Yes, this means that you can stalk us to within 3 meters). This is the big map on the viasat.com/raam page. The icons will show where each rider is at any point in time. You will probably have to zoom in a little bit to see who is who, but I am the .We also added a "Toggle Photo Overlay" button for you to click underneath the map to show you (or not show you) some of pics that we have taken along the way. Not only will it show you pics, but the pics will have GPS coordinated embedded in them to show you the exact location it was taken. Pretty damn cool if you ask me.

For you facebook fanatics, you can "like" the fan page here, or just go to the page and see what's happening: http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/pages/ViaSat-Racing/123151281053738

Please send this to your friends, share, and/or (re)tweet!!!

In case you're wondering how we do it, here is our strategy (written from last year).

These are my projected riding times.

Thank you to our Media Crew, Michelle Valenti and Desi Klaar for taking this on with us, as they will be the ones keeping you entertained. Also a BIG thanks to our sponsors, who without them, this wouldn't be possible:

Friday Funny

2010-05-28T07:41:00.000-07:00

A quick laugh before the holiday weekend...

While riding last Saturday, I overheard a conversation between a other few cyclists as they were coming to a stop.

Cyclist 1: Hey Man, you have something on your upper lip, it looks kinda black.

Cyclist 2: Really? What is it? (Looking towards cyclist 1 while trying to rub something off).

Cyclist 1: It's rubber from you sucking my wheel

Damn.

2010 RACE ACROSS AMERICA

2010-05-21T16:12:00.000-07:00

"None of our friends are normal" - James Walsh

It's all about the bike!

Next up on the race list is Race Across America. Yes, I am that crazy to do RAAM 6 weeks (to the day!) after IMSG. This will actually be my "fun" race this year (well, at least I hope it will be).

"Fun race Denner? Riding your bike across the country as fast as possible? Fun? WHY?"

This will be the last year I can, and will probably want to, do RAAM. Ever since last year, I knew I wanted to do this again. Over the winter, we started assembling what will be the fastest team we have ever assembled (on paper anyways).

This year, I plan on documenting the race much better than I did last year. I was so concerned with riding my absolute hardest (as I should have been), that I literally let the country fly by me without capturing it on film and video. Yes, I have memories, but even those get blurry. This year, I don't want to let that happen. Stay tuned for more on what the team and I plan on blitzing out to the world media wise.

The plan between now and June 12th (holy crap!) is to major in cycling, with a minor in swimming, and hopefully, running (ok, so it's not ALL about the bike, but don't tell my teammates!). I do have a new road bike added to my arsenal, which was purchased primarily for this cross country jaunt.

Stay tuned for what will hopefully be 2+ weeks of some crazy cycling before the mayhem starts...

ps- We are looking for media people to help document our journey. Our media crew will be responsible for conducting short, fun interviews, taking videos and pictures of the riders and crew, updating the teams youtube and twitter accounts, along with updating the teams’ blog. All expenses are paid. Contact me if interested.

Knee Diagnosis

2010-05-10T11:14:00.000-07:00

ITB Syndrome

I met with Dr. Runco friday afternoon to find out what the hell happened to my knee at IMSG. Dr. Runco has an extremely good reputation with identifying injuries and coming up with recovery plans, so I didn't want to muddle with anyone else that might say "Oh you have runners knee. Don't run for a month, and you'll be fine". I went through the symptoms, and it was pretty clear that I had ITB syndrome. A few "tests" later pretty much confirmed it, but I also have a mild form of tendonitis. The good news is doc thinks I will be running in again in 2 weeks.

What is ITB syndrome?

For a number of reasons (common ones are running downhill, uneven ground, overuse, weak hip abductors), the illitibial band becomes tight. Because the ITB runs from the hip to the knee, runners can complain of tightness, but it really shows its ugly head at the knee. The circle below diagram in the below diagram shows about where I had pain:

Treatment

Stretching, foam rolling of the glute and ITB, ultrasound to break up scar tissue, the associated scraping (painful) to clear it from the area, and also electric stimulation to the vastus lateralis, which is exactly what is happening in the pic below (Chuckie says I have Monkey Feet):

Reaction and Action

Having never been injured before, let me tell you - this lit a fire under me! ITB syndrome is typically progressive, and is never just from one thing. I am taking a proactive / holistic approach to try my best to make sure this won't happen again, in addition to the above treatments:

* A few years ago, I had a spinal/hip tweek/misalignment. After 3 months of PT - it went away. I am starting to do those exercises again to make sure any alignment issues I may have will not affect training & racing

* I got an ergonomic assessment at work to make sure I am ... ergonomic. Sitting at a desk for most/all day is not exactly evolutionary,and is known to weaken the lower abs, shorten and weaken the hip flexors, promote poor posture, etc.

Although the above two items don't sound related - everything is related indirectly, so I am try to minimize any outside variables that could have negative effects on training & racing.

Good News!

ITB doesn't effect swimming (unless I am overzealous with my kick off on flip turns), or cycling. Sweet!

This week will be an easyish one before I return to full on training.

More to follow...

2010 Ironman St George Race Report

2010-05-05T12:30:00.000-07:00

The first 24 hours of this event left me rather disappointed and frustrated, but it's time to move on and make some lemonade out of the lemons!

+++

Shortly after the pro's went off, they let the cattle into the water. Having swam in the reservoir a few days prior, I knew that I needed to get in ASAP and get my face accustomed to the 59 degree water since Wednesday's outing left me with a few ice cream headaches (sans ice cream!). I got in my warm up (while my face cooled down), and less than 5 minutes from the race start, there were only a few of us (~100) by the start buoy...

I wasn't planning on starting at the front since I don't deserve to be there, but with so few people, I figured why not. Unfortunately, about 2 minutes before the start, a few hundred others rolled up, and I knew I was in a little over my head.

The first 1000m or so of the swim was chaotic as expected, but coupled with the elevation (~2,500ft), people, cold water, and a wetsuit I didn't wear enough (read: at all) in training, I was a little "flustered" at the get go. My swim time of 1:04:19 is something I was actually happy with (but think that right now, I am capable of 1:02), but my performance in the water needs work. While some people need open water practice, I need some open water practice with people since almost every time people got within a close vicinity of me (or I get close to them), I would pick my head up have a mild freak out, and lose momentum. I need to learn to ignore and not get disturbed by them. The swim finish was as glorious as ever, and I quickly proceeded to T1.

As I was changing in the tent, someone asked if that seat was taken, and I said that it wasn't. It turns out it was my buddy Marty Taylor (who qualified - again!) who I was literally living with (amongst others) that week and we were stoked to see each other!

I made the decision the day before the race to wear swim trunks and no jersey under my wetsuit rather than tri shorts and top since the air temp out of the water was to be 48 degrees, and I figured cycling with wet clothes and that temp wouldn't have made for a great start of the bike. Although it took some time in T1 to change into my gear, I think it was well worth it. I also threw on a vest, arm warmers and some gloves.

Marty and I left T1 at about the same time, and things were falling into place way better than I could have dreamed. Marty, who is a damn strong cyclist but someone I thought I could hang with, passed me shortly after leaving T1. With Marty being 6'0' 195 lbs and me being 5'7'' 147, I was sitting 7m back from him, easily enjoying some effects of legal drafting and pedaling easy as we started picking off the fishes. I was thinking "Damn, I'm just gonna sit back here for the next 112 miles and let him pull me to T2. Sweet!"

At about mile 25, there were other plans.

BOOM!!!!

The tube in my front tire blew like I have never heard a tube blow before. It sounded like the swim start cannon. Hell, it blew 10 inches of tire off of the damn rim. I quickly pulled off of the course, and told myself to remain calm, change the tire and to just get on my way. I changed the tire quickly, and when I went to put the CO2 into the tube, it went into the atmosphere, not the tube, so I quickly closed it.

"huh?"

I unscrewed the valve extender to make sure the valve core was open, and it was. I put the adapter back on the extender, and the same thing happened.

"ok, think this through, and remain calm" (as people started flying by)

I took the tire off again, took out the tube, and everything looked fine. I put everything back together, and the CO2 still wouldn't go in.

"hhmm, this is odd. maybe its the CO2 cartridge. Yes, mr. race support guy, please call a tech"

I used my last CO2, and the same thing happened - the tube was simply not accepting CO2. I obviously wasn't happy at this point, but remained calm. 10 minutes later, bike tech still hadn't showed up. Long story short, a neighbor offered to grab his bike pump from a half mile away, and after he came back with it - it took me, him, and a police officer to pump the damn tire. Can't accept outside support - whatever. I have never seen a spare be so difficult! We got it to 100psi, and I got on my way. Apx downtime = 20-25 minutes.

I didn't let it bother me (much), since man is tested not when things are going well, but when he is faced with adversity. Yes, it was unfortunate that I had a flat and was out for 25 minutes, but I wasn't going to let it ruin my day.

After I got on my bike, I got on it quickly. Since hundreds of people just passed me, there literally was a line of cyclists for the next 20 miles. So, I started picking them off rather quickly, as it’s easy to get some draft off of a 500 people all lined up. Eventually the long line of people filtered out, and I went into no man's land. This went on for about another 20 miles, then I came up to another large group of cyclists that was about 15 miles long. Same thing - I started picking them off. I was rolling!

One thing I have to say about this bike course: it is hands down the most beautiful ride I have ever done. There were a MANY times where I caught myself just taking it all in. Here are two pics that just don't do the justice:

Another thing worth mentioning: it wasn't as slow or challenging as people said, or as the profile shows. Don't get me wrong - it was challenging, but it was also fair. There were plenty of times where I was really moving - even on the back side of the course where people griped of chip seal.

I was using my new (used) 404’s, which I loved. Once those things get up to speed, the sound they make is great. I had been looking at 606’s and 808’s, but in the end, 404’s ended up being the best overall decision for me. While there was some wind on the backside of the course, the 404’s were not squirrely at all in the cross winds.

At about mile 100, I had some additional woes where I couldn't keep my nutrition down. Every time I took a swig of water, about 2 minutes later, a bunch of calories would come right up, and go right out. I figured it was time to back off on calories, and just let it come up as it needed to since I didn't want to have issues on the run. This had never happened to me in training, so it was a little odd.

I enjoyed the last descent into town, and made my way through T2 rather quickly.

My assessment of this run course is: one hilly, tough mofo.

I ran strong for the first half of the marathon - probably 1:40 - 1:45 for the hilliest course I could imagine. The only split I have is a 7:30 pace through the first 6.5 miles, most of which are uphill. At about mile 10, the same nutrition issue from the bike happened - I couldn't keep anything down. I tried not to stress it since it was my body telling me it had enough calories (albeit, maybe a little concentrated).

Shortly after the halfway point, I was brought to a screeching halt. My left knee was in some serious pain - a pain I had never felt before. This wasn’t “I’m 128 miles into an Ironman pain”. The best way to describe it was extreme tightness that didn’t want to let my knee do work. I tried jogging a few times, but I could only last about 2 steps. I stopped a few times to stretch my legs and hips, but nothing was working. It was at this point, I realized my race was basically over, as I was now relegated to walking the next 12 or so miles. I was definitely bummed, but I kept a decent attitude, and did the whole "make friends on the course" thing. I made a lot of friends, since there was A LOT of people walking!

Few highlights:

I saw all my friends on the course at least once, and even Michelle, easily the happiest, most positive person out there
I met someone who recognized me because he has come across my blog (ok, I'm a nerd, but it was cool at the time)
I figured since the "race" was over, I might as well start on recovery, and proceeded to eat - a lot. In fact, I grabbed everything at one aid station, then circled back, and got seconds on everything! After the race, I had 6 slices of pizza and a sandwich. Damn.

My friends cheered me as I sucked it up across the finish line, and we all hung out for a few hours after wards.

++++

I was obviously disappointed/frustrated with the bike, nutrition and knee issues, and continued to be so for the next 24 hours, but I knew I would come around.

Tuesday, I realized that this course was actually a confidence builder for me. I went into this race thinking that if I executed well, I would have a good performance, but not completely confident. After going through this, I have a much better idea on what I need to work on, that it can be worked on, but also what I could have done against other dudes in my AG. Now, there are a lot of "if's" here, but

If I don't flat, I would probably ride 5:40ish, putting me in 4th place to start the run
If the above happened, I don't have knee issues, and my second half run is no more than 10% slower than the first half (based off of others times of similar abilities/times)... then I'm possibly battling my friend Nick Brown towards the end of the run, and Nick qualified for Kona. I'm stoked for Nick (he was staying at our House for the week too), but I think it would have been awesome if there was a showdown towards the end. Even if I'm coming up short, then I am not too far from being "in the mix".

Lots of if's, but a guy can dream, right?

Qualifying for Kona wasn’t a realistic goal of mine in this race, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about it. Knowing what I know now … I just need to make the commitment... and execute better. A fear I have is that I age up next year, and I am not sure I can compete with the fast guys in M3034. I know a lot of what I need to do, which I plan on outlining (after discussing with Coach) at some point.

In the meantime, I'm putting a lot of energy towards recovery, and trying to get my knee right. I've never had an injury, so this is very discouraging - especially when I can feel it by simply pushing my clutch in. I will be seeing Dr. Runco on friday, and hopefully, he can get me rolling again... soon!

While some people might be discouraged from the above and never want to do one again (I did have those thoughts) – I want another shot. Will it be at St George next year? Doubtful. But, I do have some unfinished business with the 140.6 distance…

Taper

2010-04-26T12:18:00.000-07:00

When I first started with Chuckie last year, I told him I am “a Type B with Type A tendencies”. His response was “Denial just ain’t a river in Egypt” (Mark Twain), which to this day, is still one of my favorite quotes.

But really, I’m not a total Type A, OCD triathlete.

Most of the aforementioned personality types dislike taper. They scream of feeling slow, being (more) irritable, feelings of uneasiness, texting me “I f%^&kin hate taper”, bouncing off the walls , and everything of the like. They may blog, tweet (I still don’t “get” all of twitter), or whatever it is that they do.

Me? Whatever. I completely embrace the downtime. Ever once in a while, I enjoy not having to spend nearly an entire weekend day on a bike followed by a run and being shelled for the rest of the day, or a week day trying to cram in two 1-1.5 hour workouts with work, consulting and a side of insanity. Despite the world belonging to the energetic, I relish the opportunity of not needing LOADS of energy to get through everyday – both in the form of mental capacity, and calories (I love eating, but eating all the time does get annoying).

Seriously speaking though, as much “fun” as this stuff is, it’s a lot of work, and sometimes the work, like any kind of work, can be a bit much.

One of the reasons why I love taper is that it has a tendency of getting me charged up. Generally, I am not as tired as I can be during training. I try to sleep – A LOT. I try to incorporate an element of vacation with a race, which can put me at ease. I can, simply put, try to relax after a few days of decompression (while wearing compression gear, of course). In a recent Triathlete Magazine article, Tim DeBoom says “Don’t walk when you can drive, don’t stand when you can sit, and don’t sit when you can lie down.” Rest assured, with the emphasis on rest, I will take those words to heart, because my heart will need it come race day (especially for this Ironman).

Taper also lets me take the edge off a little bit. As training builds, so does fatigue, anticipation, the itch to race, and stress (as training is a stress). Lately, I have been just kind of angry, a sign that my buddy Matt Simpson says, is the sign of needing to race. Yesterday while riding my bike, and minding my own business, I was nearly run over by a car (a guy driving a convertible Toyota Solara no less [bitch]). Rather than just giving a stare down while riding away - I UNLOADED on this guy. If you could capture it as a soundtrack, it would have the "parental advisory explicit lyrics" sticker on it - a few times over. Let me tell you - it was GREAT to finally unleash some fury onto some @$$hole driver.

While people think anger is a bad thing ("oh Denner, you're so angry") - I don't. It is an energy, and so long as it is controlled and channeled in the right direction (as in, getting me towards the finish line as soon as possible), then it must be embraced. Normally, the lack of inactivity does make me a little uneasy as it does others - but less in the form of the aforementioned actions, and more in the form of getting excited because the next hard workout I do is to actually RACE.

The experience of racing is why I make the sacrifices in my life. I know I said I love the big weekend stuff, but I don’t train just to train - I like racing big "A" races. Yeah, we all do it for a million reasons, but unless we have a race as a target, then we’re just “going for a bike ride” - not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Sometimes though, going on a bike ride just seems like too much work because if I was going to do something fun, I certainly wouldn’t put training for a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride followed by a 26.2 mile run at the top of my list.

The work is done – now it’s time to have some fun. The time, as it always is, is now.

++++
ps- Merriam Webster defines taper as “gradual diminution of thickness, diameter, or width in an elongated object”.

Get your mind out of the gutter.

Mount Laguna Classic Race Report

2010-04-19T20:29:00.000-07:00

** It's hard to call this thing a race, but so it is... **

When AdventureCORPs first started advertising for the Mt Laguna Classic last fall, I was told that this had my name all over it. 103 miles, 10,000 ft of elevation, climbing Mt Laguna 3 times, etc – the normal epic weekend stuff (James, sorry if I steal your word too much - it’s just so damn fitting!). At the time, I didn’t know if Chuckie would guiding me through my 2010 season yet, so I took the conservative approach when responding: “No way, too close to IMSG, I should be tapering by then”, but secretly, I wanted a piece. Chuckie and I discussed it a few times, and his stance was simply “Do it”. Taper what?! Nonsense…

I finally got around to reading all the pre-race emails on Friday, and was shocked that they wanted all cyclists there at 5am for check in for a 6am start. Mt Laguna is over an hour from where I live, so my first thought was simply “F that”. After the initial shock, I realized that it was time to nut up! 330am it is for the alarm to go off! It was a rude awakening for sure.

I started in the third wave at 6:20am, but before I started, I insisted on getting my picture taken with Bill Walton (yes, the famous basketball player)!! At 6’11”, he undoubtedly towers over my 5’7” compact frame, and it was nothing but comedic standing next to him!

Aside from being a famous hoops player, he has undoubtedly one of the coolest job titles with his position at AdventureCORPS: “Chairman of Good Times, Social Affairs, Customer Relations and All Things Fun”.

I took off for this adventure, fully bundled up with it being 37 degrees out (!!!), but it wasn’t long before the layers started coming off.

A quick word about my favorite piece of training clothing: the Canari Element 1719. I love this thing! I was at the Canari warehouse sale back in December, and saw this jacket as I was standing in line to check out. It looked cool because it’s a jacket that had sleeves you could zip off. I tried it on, and it fit perfectly. I love this thing for the functionality of 2 zips and it’s a vest or a jacket, but also because its windproof and highly water resistant (I have ridden in the wind and rain with it, and it really is exactly what it says). Despite the 37 degree temps and wind from descending – my upper body was not cold at all. If there is one piece of winter training gear that I couldn’t live without – it would be this - hands down.

Shortly after passing the first check point, I was down in the aero position, hammering along, and I look up and sure enough, Toby just happened to driving in the opposite direction, and in a split second, we recognized each other! And this was at 6:45 in the morning out in east county! He pulled a u-ey (sp?), and caught up to me, where we chatted a little bit.

Very cool to see him out there early in the morning!

At any rate, the gist of the course is that it takes you up Mt Laguna (peak elevation of 6000 ft) 3 different ways – Sunrise Highway, Kitchen Creek, and the little known Pine Creek (Noble Canyon to the Mountain Bikers out there). Another cool part about this little jaunt is that there are ZERO stop lights, and 1 stop sign.

Going up sunrise highway and kitchen creek were fun, but not terribly challenging. Honestly, the first 75 miles aren’t much to write about: start, see toby, climb, eat, enjoy the views, descend, climb again, eat again, descend again. This event is all about the third ascent up Mt Laguna – Pine (Pain) Creek. Riders were forewarned of some 18%-24% grades, and that 20-40% of riders may have to walk. You can bet that I had another “F that” response to that concept.

There was a 5 mile or so flat to rolling section, with some “warm up” 10% little “bumps”. The 10% bumps eventually jumped to 10-15% bumps (dropping the little), and it wasn’t long before the 10-15% bumps became 16%-20+% little hills. I ascended over a little bump, and was really charged up, because I know there was pain to be had. I saw 2 cyclists stopped over the side of the road, and as I yelled something incoherent to the English language, I realized they were stopped because of a bad ass little bugger of a 20% grade hill that was greeting us. I charged it, and saw my power numbers creep quickly into the 300, 350, 400, 450, and even 500W range! I turned the corner, look up and saw this... (it doesn't do the justice... trust me)...

looked down at my HR, which was at 180 (VERY close to my max), and decided to just chill for a bit. There was no way I was going to attack this quarter mile, 20+% hill going into it at Max HR, leading to a walk. No way. So, I stopped, gathered myself for a few, and charged it hard! I got to the top of it, and was never so happy to see 14% on the next hill. There were plenty more 20%ish, and even greater grades, to be had. Basically, when you download the data – it looks like a bad ass 50 minute interval session:

Damn.

Long before the race started, we were told that were some motivational quotes along the way up this hill, strategically placed when you would need them most. My favorite sign, and just about my favorite part of the climb, was a quote by Emerson: “The world belongs to the energetic”. I’ll let you philosophize if you wish – it certainly got my brain going (and ever since!) while pounding the pedals at 170 beats per minute.

I finally got to the main road, trudged up to the top of the mountain, grabbed some h20, and did my final descent back to Pine Valley park, where I had some killer post race grub – the best empanadas I’ve ever had! I chatted it up with a few others, and headed back home where I took a diesel nap. Total time was 6:26 (6:04 moving time)

This was definitely a great, challenging course that will be part of my future training rides, and the support was great too! Chris Kostman (the owner of AdventureCORPS) is definitely a cool dude. Maybe the best thing that I got out of doing this race was thinking about maybe doing the Furnace Creek 508 one day as a 2 person team. Hhmm…

I knocked out a 2 hour run on Sunday with an easy spin to follow, and taper has officially started! This week, I will be swimming my arms off...

Damn, is St George really only a few days away now… ?

Quader Pounder

2010-04-05T12:57:00.000-07:00

For the second Monday in a row, I am walking with a limp because my quads are so thrashed from the weekend. What’s different this week, is that when I went into last weekend’s training – I still have residual soreness from the 14 hours of training I had the weekend previous! The 8 day span was all about soreness, quad pounding, and elevation. While anyone who is anyone (which I am not!) was racing, killing (and winning!) Oceanside 70.3, and Sonja winning the Moab 100 (mile run), here is what went down in my little world:

27MAR: 106 mile, 8,000ft of elevation gain assault on North County. Shitty T-Run to follow.

28MAR: The big dog hike. We left my car at 730am, and returned at 3pm. The hike was only supposed to be 5 hours, but the auto-resume function on my garmin didn’t, well, auto-resume sometimes, constantly making me underestimate our travels. I would estimate 20 miles, and 6,000 ft of elevation gain.

I honestly felt fine through the hike, and even when I got home later. However, when I woke up the next morning, I barely cleared the landing getting out of the bed. MASSIVE DOMS. When going down stairs for the next few days, it required one arm on the rail, and the other on the wall to slow the pace. It was brutal! Michelle made claims of feeling “broken” even mid week. Co-workers gasped when I told them of the hike. There was even residual quad soreness going into this past weekend! The hike capped my biggest week ever at 24.5 hours.

2 days later, I did 10 repeats up Torrey pines. Go hard, or stay home.

3APR: I was stoked for the workout: a 4 hour hike/run. Spend apx 2 hours hiking, and 2 hours running. I headed over to mission trails to basically get lost, and explore new trails. 4,000ft of quad busting elevation gain. I have been massively slacking on the picture front lately, so I borrowed a camera to take some snaps:

Where it all started:

A little canopy to run through:

Running through the fields:

Having a little staredown with a coyote (for real!):

This part was actually pretty cool. We kinda stared at each other for a little bit. I decided that I might be outnumbered, so I took a step back to turn away, and he did the same. I walked a minute in the other direction, then headed back towards him. Fortunately, that was the last I saw of him.

Mountains on a california morning - tough to beat:

I made my way past North Fortuna, and was hiking up this hill, and was greeted with this view:

This might have been my favorite part of the hike/run (although its hard to say). To crest a hill and see this in front of you ... it may sound kinda cheesy - but I felt so free. I felt like a little kid running through the woods (where I spent most of my childhood) - which really, is exactly what I was doing at that time. I haven't done an ultra run, but I felt like "I got it" as to why some do them when I laid my eyes on this.

The hike up Kumeyaay peak - canopy, and steep! (picture does not justice)

View of the valley from atop North Fortuna

Towards the end of my run, I passed a woman who was walking her dog. Well, when I passed her, "Max" apparently wanted to run with a stranger more than walk with its master, so I had a friend for part of the workout.

Then a 2 hour easy spin to loosen (kill) the legs even more.

4APR: More quad poundage – Palomar repeats. I started at the casino, and went straight to the top of the mountain. I descended and did the south grade 2 more times before descending 4,500 ft back to my car. A solid 9,800ft of elevation in the bank. Some pics:

View from the Valley:

Above the clouds:

The final break before the cloudless descent...

... where I had so much fun!

Chuckie requested the usual “weekly report” on sunday and my response was simply: MY QUADS ARE THRASHED!

The training for the past few weeks has been stellar. The weekend training has been incredible. I love weekend training that requires gathering the mental energy early in the week to get through it all. I love the EPIC workouts. I started writing a blog a few months ago on why I train (I obviously haven’t finished it), and I was ultimately getting to the point of I train because I love racing – big races. But really, as much as I don’t want to say I live for the big weekend training – I kinda do. I love the mental and physical preparation that goes into and comes out of them. I love the grind, the pain, the adventure – the shit that just sounds crazy to most – but the stuff that makes me say life truly is great.

I LOVE THIS STUFF!!!

Engine Temperature

2010-03-24T09:58:00.001-07:00

There comes a time when someone is training for an Ironman (or other big endurance event) where the engine starts burning hot, and I have officially reached that point.

Case #1 in point:

While at Chuckie's on Saturday, I tried going to bed around 9pm (my usual bed time), but was unable to fall asleep. I was hoping that reading Base building for cyclists would help knock me out, but the BEAST inside thought otherwise:

"Uh, you trained for almost 7.5 hours today. Feed me".

So, I got out of bed, went to my bag and grabbed an oatmeal raisin clif bar. It isn't my favorite flavor, but it had to do at that point. I reluctantly opened the package and took my first bite. A clif bar, especially an oatmeal raisin clif bar, never tasted so good. I proceeded to inhale the thing in about 3 more bites, maybe even 2, then laid back down.

The book still wasn't calming the demons inside of me, so about 20 minutes later, I got up, again, and made half of a PB & Honey sandwich. Rather than making those bubbly noises my stomach makes when digesting food, it actually laughed at me. I figured I could give it a minute or so for the food to sink in, but instead it laughed harder.

Desperate times call for desperate measures.

I got up, for the third time, around 10:20, and made another half sandwich of PB & Honey, only this time I doubled the peanut butter AND honey (which is very messy). Finally, my stomach fell asleep.

Case #2 in point:

Last night after completing my swim workout, bringing my daily training total to about 2.5 hours, Michelle and I made our what seems to be weekly visit to souplantation (read: all you can eat buffet). After putting down a plate of salad, a baked potato (regular, they were out of sweet potatoes, err I mean yams) with ALL the fixin's, some cheesy focaccia bread and a little desert, it got to be about 8:45, and it was time to retire.

The beast thought otherwise.

11:20pm rolled around, I rolled downstairs, and started ruthlessly raiding the cabinets. I ate the following, in order:

Fruity trail mix
Beef jerky
Honey Mustard and Onion pretzels

Michelle came downstairs about 10 minutes later, with a groggy "what the hell are you doing?" look on her face. In true caveman fashion, I grunted back:

"Hungry"

while stuffing my mouth with pretzels to the point where my cheeks rivaled a chipmunk:

I then moved onto the peanut butter chips + chocolate chips, then came around full circle back to the above 3 food items above. Michelle came down for a 2nd time, claiming that it was difficult for her to sleep knowing that I am so hungry (she's sweet, isn't she?). I assured her not to worry, as I pretty much ate whatever food was left in her apartment.

When I got home this morning at 5:15 for my 5:30 run, I went straight for my cabinets, and ate chocolate covered almonds, and washed them down with some raspberry clif blocks. Mmm mmm mmm

As you can tell, at this point in training, the choice of food doesn't necessarily have to compliment others - it just has to keep the engine burning.

Ok, now I gotta go make my second breakfast...

Weekend at Chuckie V's

2010-03-22T14:35:00.000-07:00

There have been a few things missing from training this winter, one of which is getting really worked/being outside of my comfort zone. Normally I can hold myself accountable for self inflicted pain, but going hard is always easier with others around, especially when they are faster than me. So, I headed up to Solvang this past weekend to do some training with Chuckie and 2 of his pro's, Angela and Trevor. After being up there almost a year ago, and seeing this pic from his blog post, I was pumped to be heading up there.

Saturday, we had a nice little 113 mile jaunt around the Solvang valley, amassing 7,100 or so of elevation gain, on a nice mix of flats, rollers, and hills. The road quality varied a bit as well, with some very smooth roads, and ones that even broke a water bottle cage of mine - for real! Chuckie played the domestique and sports photographer. Here are a few from the ride - there is a reason why Mr. Armstrong calls Solvang his favorite place to ride outside of Europe:

Me launching a double nostril snot rocket (as an aside, I have moved away from the single nostril action I blogged about before):

Trevor and I descending drum canyon (where my damn cage broke!):

If you can get past this being an ass shot, it really is a cool pic:

My personal favorite:

We also finalized my bike fit, which is looking pretty aero while in hot pursuit:

Yes, I am pulling up the rear in all of them, but I'll take that when riding with a male pro and probable future olympian.

We then headed down to the local track, where I was tasked with 8 x 800's at about Half Marathon pace, then 8 x 400's at about 5-10K-ish pace. After the work was done, I proceeded to eat anything and everything in site for about the next 5 hours, while being completely incapacitated to even communicate with anyone. It was a freakin great day all around - company, workouts, weather, scenery, challenge - everything.

Sunday, I pretty much did a half marathon at the track as part of a MAF test. "Brutal" you probably say to yourself, but I have always enjoyed running at the track (not to mention, this track was hands down the nicest track I have ever seen), so I actually enjoyed it.

The ride home involved a quick stop at a Kalyra to grab a bottle (or 2!), as seen in Sideways:

This weekend was exactly what I needed - ass whoopin, great weather, and a change of scenery! Stoked to keep the ball rolling! Good luck and have fun to those doing Oceanside this Saturday!

Gran Fondo WIN

2010-03-15T12:20:00.001-07:00

Paolo Bettini, Olympic Gold Medalist, and 2006 + 2007 World Champion, was seen drafting off of local chump triathlete during the Gran Fondo two Saturday's ago. Witnesses have confirmed the bizarre behavior, and photo was confirmed not to have been edited. Bettini's camp has denied accusations, and also noted that drafting off of something that small would be worthless not just for the world champ, but for anyone. Friends of the local chump have also confirmed that drafting off of him is simply "useless".

Gran Fondo "Race" Report

2010-03-08T13:09:00.000-08:00

The highlight!

Race goes in quotes because it really wasn’t a race, nor was it the race I wanted it to be.

Lately, with the ass of weather SoCal has been having (I don’t want to hear it from anyone who lives outside of CA), I feel like it’s Me versus that bitch called Mother Nature every weekend. Hard Ride? I win. Mountain repeats in the cold/mist? Ryan goes up 2-0. This weekend, she throttled me to the ground literally.

About 30 minutes before the race start, the rain started. Then it increased a bit. Then, it started to downpour. Already thinking of my race report (I’m such a nerd), I figured I could just copy my IMLP Bike RR because it was that bad. Need a pic of what that was like for IMLP? Check it:

But this time, it was 50 degrees and windy. Trying to laugh at Ma Nature, I started to cheer and yell “Bring it on” in hopes of psyching myself and others up. This shit was crazy, but I was “used to it”.

As we started, we got out from behind downtown buildings, and I started shivering. Shivering so bad to the point where my front wheel was shaking with my arms. We crossed the Coronado bridge, and got onto the strand, where hell froze over. It was windy, my teeth were chattering faster than my heart was beating, and I couldn’t feel my hands. It was then I realized this 101 mile “race” was over. If one has no strength in their fingers, how can one take in calories? I tried to squeeze my water bottle – nothing. Unpeeling a bonk breaker happened with my teeth. As soon as saw the first arrow to turn left for the 32 mile option, I took it, along with a group of other people. The combination of cold, wet and wind was just too much for me. I wish I could have been like these guys, but I just didn't have it in me.

We commiserated, then the “group” filtered out, and I was chatting with some dudes from velonews.com, in town from Boulder, where it was 58 and sunny. We approached some rail road tracks that I hadn’t seen before – they were at about 45 degrees to the road – not the usual 90 degrees.

I made a mental note, and got over the first track, but the second was a little wider, and before I knew it I was getting acquainted with the concrete, and taking out one of the guys from Boulder. I got up, and with a quick check – nothing seemed broken on me, or the bike. Some scrapes on the elbow and hip, along with some on the handlebars and rear skewer. Good to go! Boulder guy was pretty calm, with statements like “I saw this happening, so I laid it down lightly”. Laid it down lightly? Was this guy a seasoned vet in bike crashes? “I’ve gone down about 7 times in crits, so this was nothing.” Phew.

At any rate, I got back to town, bypassed the finish line, and went straight to my car. I tried to unbuckle my helmet, but couldn’t as I had no strength in my fingers! I forced the straps looser, and literally just pulled it over my head. I quickly got into warm, dry clothes, and sat in the car and warmed up until Michelle got back.

We promptly went to the VIP (free upgrade!) food tent, where I put down 2 plates of salad, 2 plates of pasta, espresso, presecco, and deserts.

I have never worked so little and ate so much. We commiserated with numerous people who bagged the 50 and 101 mile options. It amazed me that so many cyclists were trying to serve themselves food in cold, wet cycling gear, while shivering uncontrollably.

Could I have done something different about the outcome? Yeah, probably. But those lessons have been noted, and I am moving on.

"It's about the process. It doesn't matter what you do tomorrow and it doesn't matter what you did yesterday. It's about today, and making today count. That's especially true in training, but it's the same mentality that I carry into racing. Focus on the task at hand, not on the finish line, or the next part of the race, but what it is that is right there in front of you in the moment."

--Jordan Rapp

Ciò è la vita!

Potato, Sweet Potato and Yam Throwdown

2010-03-02T10:55:00.000-08:00

Shortly after posting my piece on Sweet Potatoes and Yams, I was enjoying a non-paleolithic adult beverage with Toby - locally known as, "The Man". He said that he enjoyed the post, but that he would have liked to have seen tables, data, percentages and such. Basically, he wanted me to geek out, but also to bring in a "normal" potato into the mix for comparison. James, while eating his order of "sweet potato" fries also jumped into the mix, noting Vitamins and a whole host of other things for me to geek out on.

Hence, this post.

We each discussed what we thought were sweet potatoes and yams, then James started telling tales of tuber colors and grilling. Googling for such images is rather confusing, given the US's inability to name/advertise their tubers correctly. For clarification, when I buy a sweet potato and a yam from Henry's, this is what I buy:

The sweet potato is on the left, and the yam is on the right.

When cut, the insides look like this:

Note the orange color for the yam. For any of you who get sweet potatoes with your meal, or get the frozen ones - both of which are typically orange - I'd be skeptical!

Referencing nutritiondata.com, I present to you, internet blog readers, the following (all data is per 100 grams of the tuber):

Glycemic Load (lower is better)
* Potato: 8
* Sweet Potato: 8
* Yam: 12

Inflammation Factor (the higher the number, the more anti-inflammatory [desirable])
* Potato: -46
* Sweet Potato: 123 (Good!)
* Yam: -73

Nutrient Balance (Higher is better)
* Potato: 51
* Sweet Potato: 55
* Yam: 45

CHO breakdown (Total/fiber/starch/sugar, in grams)
* Potato: 18.4/2.2/15.4/0.8
* Sweet Potato: 20.1/3/12.7/4.2
* Yam: 27.9/4.1/~/0.5 (Although I think the ~, which I interpreted to be 0, is incorrect. However, that data point is irrelevant).

Vitamins (Vitamins and %'s worth noting)
* Potato: C @ 33%, B6 @ 15%
* Sweet Potato: A @ 284%, B6 @ 10%
* Yam: C @ 28%, B6 @ 15%

In my opinion, the sweet potato is the supreme tuber choice of the three, since it is tied for lowest glycemic load, won in a landslide of anti-inflammatory properties, gets a slight nod to the nutrient balance, and with a high vitamin content primarily in Vitamin A (a strong anti-oxidant, score!)

Root Vegetables: Sweet Potatoes & Yams

2010-03-01T12:58:00.000-08:00

As you probably know, I’m a (close) relative of a caveman. I tend to eat like one, and have been known to eat with my hands at times. As an endurance athlete, I need some CHO as part of my diet, most of which doesn’t come of the processed variety. As such, this post will be about one my favorite foods: the root vegetable.

I love potatoes. I don’t have a flog (food log, and I just made that up), but if I did, I’m sure it’d have potatoes on it everyday (for the past year). I ate “regular” potatoes for most of my life, until recently, I was introduced to sweet potatoes. I loved them. They have a very unprocessed, “rooty” flavor to them. Right around the same time, I was introduced to yams. They also tasted really good. Since then, I tend to look for these morsels when venturing out to societal places of food consumption. I was confused at first, since many times, “Sweet potato” (Mr. Quayle, note that there is no ‘e’ at the end of potato, in its singular form) would be advertised, yet a yam would be the real “product”. I pondered why this was for some time, and kinda put it on “the back burner”.

One night after we both had hard workouts early in the day, I took my girlfriend on a hot date to souplantation (February was potato month there, after all). While I was getting more food, there was a customer who wondered the same thing discussed in the previous paragraph, only he was more vocal:

“Excuse me” he nearly yelled to someone behind the potato station.

“Yes sir” said an unsuspecting nearby employee, who probably learned English as a second language to Spanish.

“The sign says sweet potatoes, but these are really yams”, said the angry man

“No, those are sweet potatoes” said Hose-A

“No” _Grunt_ “Those” _Beats Chest_ “Yams”, I interrupted - scaring women and children.

Hose-A, realizing that he had an outlet, quickly vanished from the scene.

Angry customer guy quickly engaged in a conversation with me. He asked me if I worked out, to which I responded, “A little”, with a slight nod of the head (Now if I only had an M-DOT tattoo I could show off. NOT). He talked about how Sweet Potatoes had no starch, Yams had some statch and that they are just OK for people who workout. The conversation ended shortly there after because I was really hungry, but I was intrigued by his whole starch argument.

So, I did some research, and found these important bullet points:

Sweet potatoes and yams are NOT even related. Sweet potatoes are (you guessed it), potatoes (technically, part of the morning glory family), and are native to the Americas. Yams are native to central America and East Asia, are considered part of the genus Dioscorea (family Dioscoreaceae, or yam family). Huh?

Dioscorea mexicana contains a chemical that can suppress ovulation in humans and is used as the basis for birth-control pills. Whoa!

To prevent confusion, the United States Department of Agriculture requires that sweet potatoes labeled as "yams" also be labeled as "sweet potatoes".^[1] GENIOUS! I’m obviously in the wrong business. I should be suing restaurants for their false labeling, But I digress

Both are considered “low” on the glycemic index and glycemic load. Score!

Despite their mislabeling in restaurants, I really like Sweet Potatoes and Yams, find that are excellent CHO sources, very "natural", taste great, and do an exceptional job of fueling the endurance fire.

Bon Appetite!

Mountain Repeats

2010-02-22T19:46:00.000-08:00

An EPIC day...

One of my weekend rides called for 3 x 1 hour climbs on the bike, or about 3 hours of climbing all pedaled. Knowing it was going to be a hard day, I emailed the local St. George training group to see if anyone wanted to join me for some fun. The response was somewhat similar to the sound heard in this video.

One of the few places to do such a thing is San Diego's Palomar Mountain, and so I drove out there early on Sunday. For those not familiar with Palomar, there are basically 2 ways to go up: The East Grade, and South Grade. I have climbed the East Grade a number of times, so I opted for the South Grade, locally known as "the shorter, steeper side". The south grade is about 6.5 miles, with 13 switchbacks. When the Tour of California came through last year, they categorized the climb as uncategorized. I chose the south side this time around so I could collect some data on it, and because I didn't feel like driving to the east grade. Doing a workout like this requires a pretty significant commitment, both in driving at least an hour, and the mental gearing up (no pun) for such an event.

Here is the usual view of Palomar, while driving to it during the winter months. Note that you can't see the top:

As I parked my car, I looked at the temperature, which was 48F. As I got onto my bike to start my 30 minute warm up, it quickly turned into a .3 mile warm up because it was too cold & windy to ride on the flats, so I started tackling the mountain immediately.

The first climb went well, and was a little different than normal. Normally, a cyclist is greeted with nice views of the valley as they ascend, with a glimpse of where the top is during most points. Not this time. The clouds you saw in the above picture made the views during the climb look exactly like this - eerie:

I got to the top, chatted with a few other cyclists next to the snow...

... and started my descent. About 30 seconds into it, I got an ice cream headache. About 10 minutes into the decent, I had to stop because I was so freaking cold. The wind was coming UP the mountain, and coupled with my descent, I was frigid. I'm not gonna lie, there were some audible F bombs and screams.

I got to my car, and was shivering. Desperate, I opened my car to pound the half empty luke warm coffee that was still sitting in there. I was conflicted - I wanted to stay and blow warm air on my hands so I could feel them again, but I also knew that I needed to get my core temp up, so I started my second climb.

My quads immediately felt like they had cement injected into them. They felt so bad that I thought that either my brakes were rubbing, or my chain was stuck in the big ring. To my dismay, neither could have been used an excuse. 10 minutes into the first climb, my HR wasn't able to touch 140 - compared to finishing my last climb in the high 150's.

I eventually came around, my HR got to where I needed it to be, and I completed my second ascent, feeling better than the first. I looked at my garmin, and I only had 2 hours under my belt - including my one descent.

I descended again, only this time a little slower, without an ice cream headache, but with a few f bombs and shivering. I got to the bottom, and did my third ascent, feeling pretty damn good. I looked at my garmin again, and realized that I was only about 3:30 into my workout. Knowing that each descent was about 20-25 minutes, I had less than my prescribed 3 hours of climbing.

And so the justifications started:

"It's cold, windy and misting. I'm wet. I haven't felt my right foot in over 2 hours. I've done 2:30 hours of climbing in these conditions, and have already climbed thousands of feet. I can totally call it a day and be happy with what I have done. No one out here is doing repeats up this damn mountain."

But unfortunately, there was another voice in me that was winning the battle:

"You feel good right now. Hell, you don't feel like you have climbed a mountain 3 times. You're cold? Big deal, climb again, you'll warm up." and then finally it said "if you want to kick ass in St George, do another (and maybe you'll get a Carlos V bar)".

I was jazzed up. I did the descent. I got back to my car, and took in some more calories. I grabbed my headphones, and put on Sam's Town. I was ready to rock. I CRUSHED the mountain for the 4th time. I got to the top, and I was smiling - in 45F, the rain, by myself, next to a pile of snow. I reflected for a second, put on Phoenix, and descended - smiling, and possibly singing (thankfully, no one heard me).

I took this picture on the way down, showing the cloud line that I just got under:

After I got back to my car, I turned it on, blasted the heat, packed my bike, and did the most natural thing I could think of: I emailed Chuckie asking "Did you hear/feel that boom?" He said that he had no idea I what I was talking about, and asked if I was OK. I responded with "That was me shitting thunder all over Palomar!" I think he was pretty excited, and asked me to call him, but I couldn't. I was shivering uncontrollably! I sat in my car for no less than 15 minutes with the heat blasting so I could warm up. And people say San Diego doesn't get cold...

After thawing, I finally gave him a call, and we had a great convo about being cavemen, expanding that ole comfort zone, and some other things.

It was an Epic Day. A day so easily justified to not even happen. A day that raised my mental confidence, and expanded the comfort zone. A day that makes me want to get back out there again. A day worth blogging about (of course I thought about the blog while being on the mountain).

I LOVE THIS STUFF!

Totals from Garmin:
5 Hours
54 miles (26 of climbing)
10,300 ft of elevation gain (making for an average 7.1% grade)

"There is great advantage in training under unfavorable conditions. It is better to train under bad conditions, for the difference is then a tremendous relief in a race." Emil Zatopek - one BAMF who won his last olympic gold running his FIRST marathon.

2010 San Dieguito Half Marathon

2010-02-16T13:09:00.000-08:00

Going "notes" style for the first time I ran the San Dieguito Half Marathon...

Positives:

A new PR! 1:32 and change.
Passed a lot of people on the downhills, and towards the end of the race, including the last hill
Had enough for an all out sprint at the end
Mental confidence boost since I didn't think I had as much run fitness as compared to Wildflower last year
Beautiful weather, gorgeous course
Ran it on nearly zero calorie intake (by coincidence; it wasn't a goal)
Negative splits through the race

Things to work on:

Keep building the engine/get faster
Train on more hills - one can never get enough of them, especially for IMSG
Lose ~5 lbs(+?) by IMSG
Be ready for 26.2 miles of concrete in 10 weeks (after a long ass bike ride)

Other

For the first time EVER, I craved a beer after the race (although, it took 75 minutes for that craving to come about). A bunch of us made our way to the beer garden, and I sampled both of the "hoppy" beers. I think one was Green Flash, and the other was "Hoppy" something. I don't know - they could have been called Diaper and Ass for all I care. I really hate throwing anything away, but seriously, both went in the garbage after about 3 sips. Oh the horror James - let the flaming begin!

A Hard Ride

2010-02-08T16:46:00.001-08:00

Saturday's long ride was postponed to Sunday this past weekend, due to Mother Nature bringing in more rain. The forecast stayed pretty consistent throughout the week for Sunday which was a chance of a few showers in the morning, and turning partly cloudy in the afternoon. I was banking (hoping!) on Sunday being decent to ride in.

When I first received my workout, I thought it could be achievable by most means. I knew it was gonna be a hard day, so I asked my buddy James to join me for a little jaunt around the whale's vagina. The long ride called for "A hilly 5.5 hour ride, keeping the HR around 150-155".

But what really happened was a 6 hour ride, with an average HR of 135.

"Sandbagger!" you say. "Jaunt around the whale's vagina? Looks like a measly PCH spin. I thought you're training for a hilly Ironman. Yawn".

"Negative Ghost Rider" is my response.

The numbers lie!

The weather was far from normal San Diego day on Sunday. It was about 55 degrees, with some damp roads, all cloud cover, and a bit of wind. About 90 minutes in, James mentioned "It looks like there is some weather up ahead." Sure enough, we hit some rain around Lake Wohlford. While this would scare some, James is no stranger to getting dirty with CX and Xterra racing, and me - well, any time I train in the rain, it brings back memories from IMLP. Not made of sugar, I tend not to melt in such weather.

I had a minor mechanical malfunction on my rig which proved mildly frustrating, and James and I ended up getting separated (I can't wait for his recap, getting chased by dogs on multiple occasions), and I eventually started making my way back west. I ended up back in elfin forest, where I was greeted with some of the gnarliest head winds I have experienced. I noticed that my HR was hovering in the low 140's - hardly what it "should" be. I would then surge to 260 - 300+W, with a 1, maybe 2bpm increase on the HR. "Ow, No Thanks", is what I thought when trying to hold these surges for minutes on end.

By the time I got into San Elijo, a quick mental calculation had me arriving back home in under 5.5 hours. So, I did what any abnormal cyclist would do 4.5 hours into the ride - I climbed the south side of San Elijo hill with the full intent of going down the other side, and climbing back over - just to get in some more hills.

Back to the HR thing - even climbing the north side San Elijo hill, which is about a mile long @ 9% grade - 150HR was untouchable. I could grit my teeth all I wanted, but the suck still sucked. At this point, I was hungry, cranky, cold, fatigued and irritable.

I eventually made my way back to the PCH so I could get home. As I neared home, I noticed that it was gonna be a 6 hour, 100 mile day. "Sweet!" I thought. Yes, I ended up feeling pretty good about the numbers, but really, the numbers meant far less to me than the mental side of things.

Today's ride was way more about mental training, than physical. The weather sucked. The fatigue sucked. The hunger sucked. Training for an early season Ironman sucks.

But, 100 miles in those conditions? Hell Yeah!

Knowing that others were bagging their bike rides completely for the weekend? Chumps!

Knowing that some are grinding away on the trainer. No thanks!

All that stuff is great for bragging, but really it was the numerous mental hurdles that I passed along the way, which made the ride worth every second. It was the teeth gritting, the suck, the cold, the wind - everything - and I rode right past it all.

Train the body, and train the mind.

ps- ok, this is pretty funny. If you know me, you know I am kinda cavemanish. and I don't lie when I say I wanted to beat my chest after I got home.

A letter to my Coach

2010-01-29T15:51:00.000-08:00

Dear Chuckie,

I didn't like you on thursday. I disliked you for giving me tons of anaerobic sets in the pool. I was not happy with you for wanting to coach me to a successful Ironman on May 1st.

First, you start me off with "mixers". I prefer drink mixers.

Then, you give me golf sets. I really don't like golf. When people ask me if I play golf, I say "I haven't reach that age yet." I would rather watch the lifetime channel on tv while on the trainer with one of my neighbors drinking beer next to me and taunting. Kind of like in the picture below from last Sunday (only I wasn't watching lifetime, I was watching this):

(Yes everyone, that is a Christmas tree still up, yes I am on the trainer, and yes, the sun is out. Don't ask why either)

Then you give me 12 x 200's at 97.4% effort, and, let's not forget that I wasn't allowed to go any harder than that (in more ways than one). The distaste for you was so much that I couldn't taste the chlorine in the pool, and whatever else people leave in there. Maybe if the pool was 55 degrees, I wouldn't concentrate on my displeasure for you so damn much.

But, no worries, it wasn't long before I had ill feelings towards myself. I was ticked off at myself for signing up for an early season Ironman. It's the end of January, and I feel like I should be training as if I should be in mid-season form.

Whoa, I'm doing all my sets consistently. Catch breath, now send off

Ok, I am going to stop thinking now, because thinking is leading to bad karma, and sometimes, its easier to not think, than think, especially during hard swim sets. Wait, not think? I love thinking! Now, I am back to having a bad taste in my mouth that I can't taste thinking of your name.

Then, the dissatisfaction turned towards my friends. As in, all my friends who signed up for Ironman St. George, which is part of the reason why I signed up to do this event. Most of these friends are friends who I go up and camp with at wildflower. But they wont' be there this year because Ironman St George is on the same day as wildflower, which means I can't have fun with them. At this point, I now have a beef with North American sports, and it has nothing to do with the near $600 I had to "drop" just to "do" this "event".

Whoa, I just did all my 200's on the same interval, and although it hurt, it hurt a little "less" than normal - it's hard to describe. Wait, maybe all these hard ass anaerobic sets are working. Hey, this guy does know what he is talking about! 200 double backstroke, and I am outta here. Damn, that was a great workout! Glad I caveman'd up and did it, and finished with a smile on my face. Life is good!

-Denner

ps- Despite my griping, it really was a great workout. I really am not a bad high maintenance athlete - I just had no motivation to be in the pool. I had early morning meetings, all morning, and a slight hangover from birthday festivities the night prior. Pool time was not desirable. Many times I wanted to "bag" it. But, I gutted it out, and it ended up being a great confidence builder. Thanks for being a great coach. I am glad you push me out of my zone of comfort.

pps- This is the third blog post in a row about swimming. What is this world coming to?

A Refreshing Swim

2010-01-23T14:03:00.000-08:00

I had a swim scheduled for this morning, so I headed up to my normal place of swim, the pure fitness pool in Carlsbad.

I walked out onto the pool deck, and noticed there was only one other person in the pool, although, he was finished and just getting out. I asked him the usual question "How is it?".

He waited a second or two before responding, and came back with "Refreshing", with a snicker and a sarcastic tone.

Having just swam in the same pool two days prior at 6:30am, when the air was cool, and the water was the usual 70ish degrees, I innocently asked "Is it warmer than the air?".

I noticed there was another delay in his response, and this time I didn't wait. I dipped my toes in, and responded for him "Holy shit!". He laughed, knowing that he was getting out, and I was getting in.

My warm up was supposed to be a 350 yard "mixer", mostly non-freestyle. About 12 yards into it, I literally picked my head above the water because I was laughing so hard it was so cold. I did the same when I got to the other side of the pool. The warm up, in all senses of the term, quickly turned into a 350 yard freestyle nearly all out time trial just to generate body heat.

I knocked out about 1700 yards before my shoulder told me to stop, then I jumped in the jacuzzi for 10 minutes, showered, and then decided to stop by the managers desk on my way out to inquire about the water temperature. I figured they didn't warm the pool on the weekends, or the heater was broken. He assured me the heater was indeed working, its just that when the were putting the covers on this week, the wind was blowing them off, so they didn't bother with them last night. We laughed, and I went on my way.

As I was driving home, still trying to warm up, I wondered what the water temperature was, so I called them back. I explained to them that I just swam in the pool, and found it rather cold, and was wondering what the temperature was. Of course the girl at the front desk didn't have "access to that information", so I decided to turn on my charm (yeah right), and talked about how water temperatures like that in the ocean are normally reserved for wetsuits. She then happily went to go ask someone as to the current temperature.

She came back a minute later and said "Sir. Hi, yeah, the water temperature is 55 degrees".

55 DEGREES!!??!!?

I might have yelled that into the phone, we shared laugh, and then I hung up (I think she had enough of my charm).

So, despite a meager 1700 yards, I still felt like a BAMF and putting on a performance worthy of a Carlos V bar.

Operation Triceps

2010-01-11T15:56:00.000-08:00

For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of meeting San Diego’s Gurujan Dourson, one of his (many) mantra’s goes something like this:

If you want to be a faster biker, bike more
If you want to be a faster runner, run more
If you want to be a faster swimmer, take lessons

Years later, I decided it’s finally time to take his advice, and got me some.

Better late than never, right?

I asked my friend Carrie to help me out with my swim stroke. Surprisingly, she accepted (all that time in the chlorine must have had an effect on her processing abilities. Thankfully she didn't ask for a video first!). Carrie is a rock star swimmer, and there is nothing more to say to it than that. She could kick your ass. I figured that if I can simply make my stroke more effective and/or more powerful, that’s gotta make me faster given the same swim volume. Seems reasonable.

Yesterday morning was my first swim lesson. She asked me my objectives, and asked me to swim a few laps. Some easy, some builds, and then an all out set. After the all out set, she started to talk, and the words came out of her mouth…

“You’re stroke isn’t, umm…”

For those of you who don’t know Carrie, she is very mild mannered, nice, and would never hurt anything (unless you ask her for a swim set). I could tell she was really trying to be nice with her choice of words:

“… horrific.”

Horrific? Really? Wow. I guess that’s better than “the worse I’ve ever seen”. I could barely hold back the laughter. She couldn’t.

After a few more laps, we realized what the main issues were:

• I don’t glide enough
• At the end of my stroke, I push off way too much. It’s like I’m trying to move the air above the water.
• And the best/funniest – at the end of my stroke on hard efforts, when my hand comes out of the water, my palm rotates inward (toward my body), thus pushing the water laterally across my back. She mentioned that she had a general concern for people in not just the next lane over, but the lane after that one. Sheesh.

After a few laps of instruction and trying to do a lot at once, I finally started getting the hang of it all (although, there is still is no chance in hell for me to count “one one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one-thousand" while swimming.). I was gliding more, and pushing water, not air, backwards. Imagine that! Hey Mom – look at me – I can splash backwards now!

Anyways, onto the title of this post – my triceps were F-E-E-L-I-N’ I-T! Woof!

She mentioned that they will continue to be feelin’ it for the next couple of sessions. The 2700 yards I did this morning confirmed that.

While en route to getting a burrito after wards, I showed her a sample workout from Mr. V. She asked if I actually used the inner tube that he prescribes. I said No (sorry coach).

Well, apparently, I wasn't full from the burrito because when I went back home, I was eating my words when I opened an email from Chuckie that said "Buy this."

Counter Balance

2010-01-05T10:43:00.000-08:00

If you can't have good without evil, sweet without bitter, success without failure, ham without the burger, then you can't have balance, without a counter-balance.

Ever since I wrote about balance (and with inspiration from CV's latest, and a conversation I had recently), I re-read a previous post I wrote - Extremes. The gist of the post was I had a friend who said I was so "extreme". Extreme, being a relative term of course. Doing a half Ironman - that's extreme. Talking about doing RAAM - that's extreme. She was one that generally liked being in a zone of comfort (not to be confused with, but certainly similar to, Z1 in training - it can get you somewhere, it's just boring). There's nothing wrong with that way of life (PC, speaking) - that was her MO. But, that wasn't ME.

My response was that to do anything great in life (or, let's just start with something a little more than ordinary), then you have to to be a little, or a lot, extreme - depending on how big your goals are. Take anyone who has reached their personal best, a community/group/team's best or even world's best, in anything (worth talking about anyways; losers need not read anymore) - and they had to make sacrifices. They had to put balance on hold a bit, and be a little "extreme". They had to sacrifice some things - whether that be sleep, a social life, family time, denero - whatever. Upon achieving their goal, I am sure each and every one of them would say "it was (well) worth it".

One thing they probably learned about whatever journey they embarked on, is how aligned their goal(s) is with their comfort zone. At the risk of sounding rather nerdy, if you think of two concentric circles, with your comfort zone being the inner/smaller one, you better realize that at some point, that thing is going to have to expand at some point, if you are to reach your goals. The greater the disparity there is between them, the greater the chance that your comfort zone won't allow you to reach your goals. The more pliable and expandable it is, well, "the sky's the limit".

It's rather paradoxical that humans are innately lazy creatures, yet we are at our best when we are challenged and stressed. To steal a line from Jon Voight in last season's 24 (one of the few shows worth watching): "Stress is the fertilizer of creativity".

(As an aside, I was extremely lazy over the holidays. Michelle and I finished an entire season of 24 [that's, 24 episodes] in less than 48 hours [not the first time I have done it], and I (we) loved every second of it.).

If I learned anything about the last year of my life balancing work/life/school/training/stuff, it was only to confirm what I thought a few years ago when I wrote of extremes and comfort zones. The more you are out of that good (?) ol' zone of comfort, the better off you are (or will be, someday), the more adaptable you are (hey, if caveman never adapted, then you wouldn't be reading this blog!), the greater your patience/stress threshold can be, and not to mention - feeding that ego and developing confidence, whether it be physical, mental, or both.

Life, as in training, has stress(es) applied to it, and after proper recovery, we are stronger for it.

Holiday Music

2009-12-22T13:23:00.000-08:00

This is all the holiday music I need!

Balance

2009-12-01T12:20:00.000-08:00

Balance

It's a term thrown a lot / not done a lot

* A well balanced meal / have you seen society's wasteline lately?
* Balance a checkbook (whats a checkbook anymore?) / Hello I.O.U.S.A.!

Balance is a huge part of my life, for reasons unknown and known. I could write an entire post on my (lack of?) experience with it (but will spare you). Hell, I have even thought about creating another blog to get my thoughts and experiences out (but obviously haven't).

Recently, I really enjoyed two recent blog posts by Trevor. In his most recent one, he talks about taking time off from his passion/profession (triathlon) due to injury, and takes an outside view of the sport, the people in it, and how narrow minded they are - the lack of balance they have. You see, Trevor gets it. He gets that you need balance in life, which he has.

Like Trevor, James gets it too. It seems like every blog post he has talks about the same thing - winning some race somewhere in the state of california, and how about how good the beer he drank afterwards is. He works hard, he plays hard, and has been known to keep it mellow. He has balance.

I am almost finished with a book called egonomics. Most of (the two of) you that read this weblog are into endurance sports, where there is certainly no lack of ego's. Although the book is written for working professionals, there are a lot ways that it can be applied to real life (and I'm not talking about "reality" tv here). For example, the chapter on humility starts out with the following quote:

"True humility is intelligent self-respect which keeps us from thinking too highly or too meanly of ourselves. It makes us modest by reminding us how far we have come short of what we can be". (Ralph Sockman).

I love that second sentence.

Then there's a couple pages before it dives into a really good section called "I'm brilliant, but I'm not". These are just two examples of what the book is all about - balancing your ego.

My roommate Graham, who despite being a CFO and winning a 100 mile hundred endurance run (in addition to being a family man), has got to be one of most modest, down to earth people I have ever met. There is no doubt that his ego got him to the top of the corporate and athletic worlds, yet he is balanced out by modesty, and the desire to always do better.

I could go on and on, but really, Chuckie summed it up best months ago with his yin/yang piece (Apparently, I am quite transparent b/c no one has ever "known" me so well after such little time):

"to laugh at ourselves while taking ourselves seriously, to congratulate ourselves while berating ourselves, to work and play at the same instance, to live and yet know that at the very same moment we are dying. Get busy living and get busy dying."

ps- After publishing this, I came across this from AC. Awesome.

Boring update on training not being boring

2009-11-12T09:29:00.000-08:00

Nothing extravagant lately, just a lot of solid, consistent training.

Things have been pretty good since I got back on it in early October, and progressing nicely. When I first got back on the bike, the power numbers were ... well ... not powerful (as expected). What didn't help is that the same week I started training (consistently) again, I decided to give blood that Monday. Giving blood is something that always left me feeling good mentally and physically (except for when I am actually working out for the next week or so), so I figured that the numbers could only go up, right? So far, so good. I have been knocking out some near 2 hour trainer sessions, and the kicker is I have really enjoyed them! (CV, if you're reading this, that is not a typo).

On that note, those trainer workouts have been done using a bit of spontaneity (As an aside, whats kind of interesting [because a 2 hour trainer ride is anything but] is that the spontaneity was not influenced by, but just happened to coincide with this little gem). A lot of my training for the past month or so has been by feel. Those trainer workouts, I really had plans to do an hour and change. But, somewhere along the way, I was feelin good, like real good, and just continued on pedaling. Next thing you know, I am creeping up on the 120 minute mark, and I could keep going! WTF! The same thing happened in the pool last week. I had one early ass meeting at work, and jumped in the pool after the meeting. I had plans to do about 2400ish yards. Well, scratch that - I knocked out over 3200 (I actually lost count) - which is the most I have done since ... IMLP back in '08. I got out of the pool feeling like a million bucks (except for my stomach, which I might have actually heard growl underwater).

Not to neglect the run (because in a triathlon, if you neglect the run, the run neglects you), that one BAMF Graham Cooper I wrote about a few months back - is now one of my roommates. We went for a "little run" last night after work. If I could sum up the run, I would quote him when I say "Wow, we could probably do a pretty good job of beating the shit out of each other training for St. George". In between the panting, I was able to muster out a "Yeah", although it probably sounded more like a grunt. Seeing as though he isn't training for WS100 this year, he has targeted IMSG to be his "A" race. Not that I am on a level to compete with someone who can brag about this (although, he is way too humble to ever brag), it will certainly stoke the competitive fire that resides at our place of residence.

Happy Hal.... Big Bear Camping

2009-11-03T16:09:00.000-08:00

Michelle and I passed on the local halloween party circuit for a weekend of camping up at Big Bear Lake (training at elevation just happened to be a perk). It was a solid weekend! Below is how it went down, up there (at 6,800 ft)

As we crested at the top of the climb, this was what we were greeted with. Big Bear Lake looks so small from afar...

Once we got to the lake, and looked towards where we just were, the views just kept getting better...

Everyone told us it was gonna be cold up there. The frost on my car Saturday morning confirmed...

However, things did warm up down at the lake...

As we ate breakfast, we were greeted by a number of the locals, begging for our food

Don't do it!

Got it!

I called this picture "being watched"

Bike Ride

Since I rode to onyx summit last year during ride around the bear, I decided it would great doing it again, sans the 6000 ft of climbing (in less than 35 miles!) leading up to it (although it was missed, in only a way that an endurance athlete can miss climbing)

Here's Michelle wearing her "holiday" appropriate gear, on the "flat"

I'm sorry, did I mention "Flat"? Looks can be deceiving...

At the summit...

Ok, nerd memory here. This year, I rocked yellow/black gear, with a blue/silver/black bike.

Last year at bear century, I had a yellow/black bike, sporting blue/silver/black gear.

Did I really publish that on the internet?

After that, it was back to the site for some dinner. But before, the obligatory sunset picture over the lake...

The obligatory campfire picture (it was as warm as it looks)...

Sunday Hike

We had to cut this one a little short, but a solid 3.5 hour hike nonetheless. Undocumented was hiking up to about 8200 ft, which you can't see in this picture, but trust me, its there!

PCT

Yes, that's snow

The obligatory "doesn't do the justice" picture...

Summit!