Starting Over

I am now training again. I have signed up for two late season races, the OC Tri, and olympic distance race and SOMA 1/2 Ironman in Arizona in late October. Over the last 4 months my training decreased quite a bit due to the birth of our daughter, Kinsley. However now everything seems to be stabilizing. The last 12-18 months work has been a bit challenging due to the economic slowdown, that coupled with a growing family made training consistently a bit tough.
I have finally joined a Master's swim program. The first week was a real wake-up call. I usually just swam by myself which I know wasn't the best training. I also had never swam long course before. Let's just say that week one was rough. I really think that over the next two months I should be able to get faster and feel great coming out of the water.
My goal for SOMA is to go under 5:12 which was my time in last years Vineman. I am not sure if it is realistic or not but we will see. I really need to find a way to run faster!

Weekly Totals-

Swim- 6500

Bike-85

Run-22.5

Keeping It Together

I have been pretty disappointed with the amount of work that I have been able to put in lately, but I hope that will change shortly. Saturday I went for a ride with three of my buddies only about 30 miles. After a little warm up I put in some hard efforts and dropped them twice which felt good. Saturday afternoon I got in a swim of about 2500.
Easter was a pretty full day with the family. I wanted to run in the afternoon but got addicted to The Masters.
This morning i ran for an hour and hopefully will get out of work in time to get in a little swim. This morning I weighed 180lbs. That is a kinda heavy. I know I have put on some muscle but not enough to weigh 180.

It's been a while

So I pretty much don't blog anymore. Oh well, I guess it is all about Twitter these days. I am not tweeting yet but I am sure it is only just a matter of time. It seems that it would be much more my style. I can handle two or three sentences at a time. So a lot has happened since the last blog. I completed the first tri of the season. I am about to complete my first real estate deal since December, and most importantly we are now a month away from having our daughter, Connor the model in the picture, is convinced we are naming her dinosaur.

In November I took a large leap of faith. I had been working at a company for several years and as my industry of selling office buildings began to slow, I made a jump. I stayed in the real estate industry but went to a company who specializes in a different area of the real estate business. I tell people it was starting over, but with a ton of experience. As I near completion of my first deal, it feels like I might be able to breathe again. I really began to feel the pressure of a 2nd child on her way, a nice house, a wife who has had the ability to work part time, a tough economy etc.... I am happy with the decision that I made, I think it took guts and everything is working out well.

Superseal- So my first race of the season was the Superseal. I originally was planning on doing the Superfrog which is a 1/2 ironman but decided with some guidance from my unofficial coach to just do the Olympic distance. Because of the struggles with work and the pressure of getting out of survival mode my training has not been what I would have like but oh well. And i also got sick the day before the race. I decided to race anyways, i was hoping to have my new wetsuit but unfortunately I got the wrong size and had to wait for a one that fits, of course it came in the day after the race. Jen at Tribuys was nice enough to let me borrow one. So just like always I decided that my first open water swim of the year would be race day. I felt awful in the water as the we were sent off but like always i got thru it and swam about 25mins. The transition to the bike was for sure the furthest i have ever had to go. Got on the bike and for the first time ever had trouble keeping my hr down but wasn't concerned. The course was pancake flat but for half of the race there was a headwind. I was passing lots of people and rarely getting passed. One pass that i did notice was Jordan Rapp, the winner of the race. At the time I was going 24mph and he passed me like i was standing still. It was humbling. I only rode 1:09 or 21.5mph average which was actually quite a letdown. Finally got to the run. My goal was to run sub 8 min miles and I ran 7:59's, about one mile was on the sand so I am sure that slowed it down a little. I truly feel that if I wasn't sick that I could have shaved a few mins. of my time. I finished 17th in my AG if I could have knocked off 3 mins I would have been 11th. What can you do. JK always says you don't have to feel well to race well. Final time was 2:29:50 goal was 2:30. (crushed it!)

I am not really sure how training is going to go after the baby comes. My next race might not be until after summer. I still plan on doing either the Longhorn half or the Soma half as well or the Orange County tri.

I did go to the Calif half with Connor last weekend and watched Matty Reed kick ass. That boy was flying on the run. He looks fast cuz he is so damn tall. He only ran a 1:11 half marathon to beat Andy Potts. i am doing that race next year. It is too close to home not to. We also got our Tribuys gear, which I haven't picked up yet but looks awesome! I am truly stoked to be part of that team and have met some great athletes but better people.

GOOD TIMES

You know you are having a good day when you are out for your morning ride and you get a ticket from a motorcycle cop for running a stop sign. At least I had two of my boys with me to share in the fun.

Training update to come soon and pictures of the Tribuys team workouts at Sport Performance Institute.

Santa Barbara Recap

So this weekend my beautiful wife and I headed up north to Santa Barbara for the weekend. We were originally supposed to go thru Monday but we figured that we would miss Connor to much so we just stayed til Sunday. My wife loves to sleep and read so I brought my bike thinking that I would get some rides and runs in over the weekend. The weather was rainy for Friday and Saturday but both days I was able to get in a 1 hour run. I also got in a spin class on Saturday moring.
I found a bike shop on-line, Fastrack bicycles. I actually ran in there on Friday and they helped me with my bike for free which was really nice. They also pointed me in the right direction for the group rides in Santa Barbara on the weekends. Saturday's ride didn't work cuz it was pouring rain in the morning so I spun instead. Sunday there was a ride that was starting less than a mile from my hotel so that sounded good. I rode for about half an hour before heading down to the start, I was a bit early and ran into a triathlete who said he wasn't doing the group ride but was planning on doing 50 miles which was perfect for me. The guy was a 54 year old semi-retired attorney who did Vineman last year in 5:15. He told me that there was some climbing in the ride and I thought it will be good for me. The first 20 miles was more or less rolling and he said that it was part of the SB long course tri course. Then we made a left turn and the climbing began. Needless to say the total ride was 48 miles with almost 3800 of climbing. This guy thought it was 1700 of climbing, he was off slightly! Anyways it was a tough ride but i really enjoyed it. I don't even know if i can find hills like that around here. It ended at the top of some mountain looking out at Lake Casitas. It was picturesque.

Weekly Totals

run- 25 miles
bike 90 miles
swim- 4500 meter

Making Progress

This week has started off pretty well in terms of traing. I have done a little over 5,000 in the pool with yesterdays main set being 15X100 at 1:30-1:35 on 20 seconds rest. Since I haven't been swimming much in the last couple of months it was pretty much a lung buster. Tuesday I did the Tribuys morning workout and my legs were much better than last week when I couldn't walk for two days. After the workout A-Train and I ran 4.25 miles. It was the first time his hr rate was lower than mine when we have trained together. That will change soon big boy! I also got an hour in on the trainer after last nights swim. This morning I did the Tribuys workout again and did a couple of miles afterward.
Tomorrow Courtney and I leave for Santa Barbara and the little man will be staying at home with his grandparents. I am bringing the bike and plan on riding a bunch. There is also a public pool right by our hotel. It should be a good training weekend. I feel better every day and think that I may drop 10 pounds this month.