Beast in my Belly

Race day really started yesterday, when I came home to flowers from Tri-Hubby and a card that read "You Are Gonna Rock!" That was a pretty cool beginning to my Night Before the Race Vigil. I never got that last workout in, only a nap, some stretching and some quality time with my Stick. I know what you're thinking. Click on the link, you won't be dissapointed ;). Most of the evening, I just read all of your comments (You guys rock!), chilled, and packed my bag, sometimes stopping to take a big breath and keep myself calm. This was a big deal for me (in case 'ya didn't notice!) and I had to struggle to keep it in perspective at times. All in all, I kept it together and settled down for a fitfull nights sleep at about 9:00. Boy Wonder was home from college this weekend and managed to wake us up not once, but twice as he came and went trying to figure out if he was sleeping at his mom's or his dad's. But, it wasn't like I was getting alot of deep sleep anyway so, no harm no foul. Thankfully, I had read somewhere that its the sleep you get two nights before the race that really counts, so I wasn't too worried.

The alarm went off at 4:00 a.m. and I shot out of bed. I had everything ready to go the night before, so I really just ate my oatmeal, got dressed, and did a bunch more of those deep cleansing breaths. You would've thought I was in labor or something. And really, when you think about it, I was. In fact, the seed was planted in my brain in November, nine months ago, when I got it in my head I wanted to try a tri. And this morning, in the pre-dawn of my A Race, I was about to give birth to the beast I was growing in my belly these long months of training. My FTE was like the ultrasound - a little peak at what was in there, just enough to make me fall in love.

Tri-Hubby was up not long after me, packing a cooler to share with my Mom, Dad and Thithy (that's Our Family speak for sissy) and her two year old. Once again, they made the trek from the other side of two rivers to come and sit in the sun and get an occasional glimpse of me swimming, biking or running by. I'm just overwhelmed at the support of my family. This was definately not thier idea - in fact, I think they probably thought I was a little crazy to want to do this - and yet, they got up early on a Saturday morning and came out and cheered my name and kept me going. You've gotta love those people! Also, my friend Sally and her husband Steve came out - cowbells in tow - and yelled for me. Again, I'm just overwhelmed at the support I've had. The best thing about my summer in this sport has been the people I've met - in real life, online, and, twice, both. Triathletes are just awesome people.

But I digress. We made our way to the race sight by 5:30 a.m., were guided to a parking spot, and proceeded to situate Pyro on her rack and set up my transition area. This event was so well organized - bike racks were designated for each wave, the race director stood on the top of the timing chip trailer and made announcements throughout the morning, letting us know the water temp (77.5 - absolutely perfect), the rules regarding transition, reminding us to pick up our chips, telling us where the food was, etc. It really helped and I never had to deal with that "what do I do if . . ." kind of anxiety. There was a woman racked right next to me who was doing her First Tri Ever, the short course. I felt a kinship with her and told her this was only my second and reassured her that she would have a blast. Then, I walked down to the swim start. The contractions were coming closer together - I knew it wouldn't be long now. And I began to feel strangely calm. The sun was coming up over the beautiful lake. The buoys looked as far out as ever, but I knew I could make them, I'd done it before. The air was chilled but I knew that the chill would be a comfort while I was doing the work that was set out before me.

There was a pre-race meeting which pretty much repeated what the director had been announcing since dawn. Again though, it was comforting to feel like I knew what was going on, that I didn't have to worry about the details of the race, only to focus on what I could do. After the business end was concluded, he announced that Kevin Hunt, the triathlete that you may recall died during the swim leg of a race in June, had been registered to race this morning. He said that he was sure Kevin was looking down on all of us with pride - and though it sounds kind of cliche now, it did feel that way, and I was grateful that they mentioned him. We had a moment of silence for Kevin then the national anthem was sung. I got in a quick warmup and, before I knew it, it was time to head down for the swim start. It was time to deliver the beast.

My overall impression of the race was that it went by so fast - I was expecting to have a feeling like "Oh my gosh, I've been out here so long" but it never came. The swim was as close as I came to that because, well, you know, I swim slow. I still managed to pass some people - even some in the wave in front of me. That, I couldn't believe, I was like "Look at me, I'm passin' people that started five minutes ahead of me!" Of course, then I had to look to make sure they were alright and still moving and stuff, and, thankfully, they all were. I certainly got passed a lot more than I passed, but that's par for the course for me. I'll get better. I hope. Still, before I knew it, it was over and I was heading out of the water. I wasn't last in my leg, but I was close, so I was anxious to get on the bike and get moving.

Swim Split: 38:45

There was a relatively long trek back to Pyro from the beach - and when I first got out of the water I was a little woozy from being horizontal for so long. So T1 was slow.

3:16

As I ran up the sidewalks (which myseteriously hurt my feet on the way down and didn't even register on the way up), I heard Sally and Steve and Tri-Hubby and Mom and Dad and Thithy yelling my name. They were my doulas, encouraging me to keep moving, keep breathing, and the beast, the beast who's been growing and stretching and waiting to wake up, the Phoenix, she made her appearance sometime after I got on the bike.

I'm not sure I can pinpoint the exact moment of her birth - was it that first hill that seemed so hard last Sunday that just dissolved beneath my wheels today? Or was it the first person I passed along the way? Or maybe it was when I felt the wind - wind that was not made my nature because all the flags hung limp on their poles- it was my wind, Pyro's wind, the wind of the beast. Whenever she made her entrance, her presence was known througout the entire bike - I attacked every hill, often staying in the big ring all the way to the crest and feeling only exhilaration; I passed a lot of people - men, women, people on hybrids, people in kit on nice bikes - lots of people were tied to posts out there on the course this morning, especially on the up hills. I'm not saying I was never out of breath, because I was, or that my quads were never on fire, because they were, it was just that everything clicked for me and I never felt misery, only elation to be out there, to be moving, to be FLYING on my Pyro. I was yelling thank you to every volunteer, every police officer, every spectator sitting on their lawns and cheering us on. I felt so grateful to all those people who had come out to make this day safer and less stressful for all of us out there. I can't even put it into words - it almost moved me to tears. I saw several members of my team out there also. Every time we'd pass we'd yell "Go Big Shark!" Totally awesome. It all brought home the affirmation I read this morning "God is in all, and all is well." That was the perfect theme for the day.

The bike was not without my typical dorkiness, unfortunately. The beast may have been born, but she's still a little baby. There was a U turn at one end of the bike course, about half way, and I was worried about it. You know, me and cornering are not good friends. I've been working on No Wetsuit Girl's tips, and they're helping, but I ain't there yet. So, when the U turn came, I almost executed it - but I went off the road, right at the end. Into the gravel. Luckily, I was going slow, saw it coming and was clipped out and ready to catch myself. It was fine, just embarrasing. But, I laughed, said "I knew I was going to do that!" And went on.

Nutrition was going great - except for the Gu I lost somewhere on the course. Which apparently fell, open, onto my water bottle. I discovered this when I stopped, as I'd planned, to fill my empty Aero Bottle with water and switch to Gu and water for the remainder of the course. Suddenly, I had Gu all over my hands. I was laughing, trying to lick it off, my hands sticking to the handlebars. That's going to be fun to clean! But, I was getting in the calories and having fun, so it was all good.

Suddenly, I was at the end of the bike. I couldn't believe how fast it had gone! At that point, I didn't know my speed or my time as I had forgotten to set my bike computer and my watch just wasn't working right. So I was racing blind. Imagine my surprise when I saw the result online.

Bike Time: 1:22:32 Avg Speed: 18

Yep. 18. That's the fastest average I have EVER had on any 25 mile ride, much less a hilly one. I will so take it.

T2 was a little quicker, not as much run time, not as much stuff to switch out: 1:37.

The run began. The first half mile felt hard, my legs were feeling some of those hills from the bike. But, before I knew it, I was feeling amazingly strong. I felt like I was going pretty slow, but I decided to maintain for awhile. I didn't want to give up that feeling. I can't describe how awesome I felt. My legs felt fresh, springy even, my breathing was easy, I didn't even notice the hills on the run. It was like they didn't exist. And I passed people. In fact, I only got passed by one person that I can remember. Of course, it was a chick. In my age group. But I let her go. I was having way too much fun, feeling way too awesome to let that get me. The run seemed to fly by. And, I saw Tryan out there! He looked really strong. He yelled "Go Phoenix!" And I yelled "Go, Tryan!" So, there wasn't any earth shattering wisdom exchanged, but it felt good anyway.

Soon, it was time to turn around. Now, I thought, now you start to pick it up. At first, it just wasn't happening. Legs were like "Nope, we like this pace. This feels good to us. Tell your time goal to kiss it." But, after I passed the 5 mile mark, I was able to convince them to give a little more.

As I rounded the corner to the finish line, I heard Tryan yell "Go Phoenix" again. Then I heard Tri Hubby and Mom and Dad and Thithy and legs said "Let's RUN." And so we did. I crossed the line, heard the beep, and Tri-Hubby was there to put his arms around me.

Run: 54:28 Pace per mile: 8:47. That's a PR. I guess I wasn't going as slow as I thought. That, or the beast has wings.

Final Time: 3:00 even. 5th out of 13 in my Age Group.

That's just peachy with me.

After I finished, I was hanging out, soaking all of it in when I saw a woman in my wave come across the finish line. I had noticed her at the start, looking nervous, and had seen her again on the run - she was headed out while I was coming back - and she had looked like she was struggling but hanging in there. I'm pretty sure she was last in our age group - and one of the last people across the finish - but when she finished, she let out the most triumphant "Whooo!" and her little girl, who couldn't have been more than two, rushed into her mommy's arms. I thought, "She's like me." She probably decided some time this year that she was going to try to do this. And, like me, she probably didn't know if she could. But, she did. And that was her triumph. It was my triumph too. At that moment, I had no idea where I stood in the final results. And I absolutely didn't care. That woman's finish was my finish. We were out there together, giving birth to something we'd never imagined. Something that makes us more than what we were last winter. Something that makes us more than "enough".

Deep. Breath.

OK. Almost there, peeps, almost race time.

I'm trying to work on my mental game, visualizing a flawless performance, no fatigue, channeling Rocky Balboa and all that stuff.

This morning I decided against my final "tune-up" workout (just a short warm up with a couple of short sprints on both the bike and the run) because my Achilles felt tight when I woke up and I have injury paranoia right now. Sigh. Now I'm thinking I may do it after work but I'm a little worried that'll be too close to the race - any of you experienced folks care to chime in? To Tune Up or Not to Tune Up, that is the question. Whether tis nobler to suffer the ups and downs of a twenty minute workout or to take arms against impending injury and, by resting, end them. Sorry, my theatre is showing.

I was supposed to go see Princess sing the National Anthem (along with her choir) at the baseball game tonight, but Tri-Hubby wants to stay and watch a couple of innings and that'll put us home at nine or later and I gotta pack my bag and get my nutrition together and clean my bike and I think I would just be a bundle of nerves and completely spoil the fun so . . . I'm not going. Selfish? Yes. Avoidable? No. Meanwhile, I'm sitting here at work trying to stay positive, focused and pumped. Easier said than done.

Props out to Jane, who's got her first Oly this weekend too - we're gonna rock it, chicka. You know it, I know it and the Blogosphere knows it. And to Tryan, who'll be there tomorrow - Dude you are going to kick some major ass out there! See you at the post-race Chevy's pig out! And to everyone racing this weekend - work it and have a blast out there, everybody, let's try not to forget that this is supposed to be fun! Let's get this party started!

I also want to thank all of you - for reading, for commenting and for all the support you've given me during this thing. I've said it before and I'll say it again - you folks have kept me going, kept me accountable and kept me sane. I'm overwhelmed by the blessing of your friendship. So, thanks!

See you on the flip side!

Taper Pyschosis (TMI, Profanity Warning!!!)

Anyone else feel like a complete psycho during this taper thing?

This has been me the last 48 hours or so:

Oh man, I feel great. I'm one badass MF. Oh yeah, I will kick some major ass come Saturday. Watch. Out.

5 min. later
Holy, Shit! What was I thinking? I must have been on crack when I registered for this race. I'm such a loser. Why didn't I get on the bike more?

5 min. later.

Oooo. Tri Hubby. Hubba Hubba. Wink, wink. He is lookin' good.

30 min. later

Oh man, I really like this taper thing. I have sooo much energy!! Yep. Feelin' good, baby.

10 min. later

Who do I have to kill to get a bagel around here? I think I could eat my arm.

5 min. later.

I'm fat. I'm freakin' huge. I bet I won't even be able to get into my tri shorts. Damnit why did I have to eat a half a dozen bagels? Somebody shoot me, please!

5 min. later

I am going to shoot somebody. I need to run. I need to bike. If I have to sit here for one more minute, I swear to God my head is going to explode!!!!! I will physically maul the next person that rings that phone. So. Help. Me. God.

5 min. later

I need a nap. Maybe I could just crawl under my desk. ZZzzzzz.

5 min. later

Oh man, I feel great. I'm one badass MF. Oh yeah, I will kick some major ass come Saturday. Watch. Out.

And it goes on. Anyone else feel like this? Anyone? Anyone? Hello? Shit.

Feel the Burn

Sometimes taper sucks, at least in my limited experience. Sometimes your legs feel heavy, even achey from those miles of intense training piled on in the last weeks of peak. You want to eat everything and snap at everyone who looks at you sideways. The tiniest things set you off like a stick of dynamite.

But sometimes, sometimes taper rocks. When you hop on the trainer for a quick set of intervals, revving that engine until it wants to explode then head out for a mile or so to let those legs run - and you feel the power, in your legs, your lungs, your mind - you feel like an animal that's been let out of its cage. Or like one of those toy cars you had as a kid - the kind that, when you pushed it backwards over and over on the linoleum, you would wind it and it made that tiny revving sound until you finally set it down and it took off like it was shot out of a cannon, ramming its tiny hood into the kitchen wall. That little car was meant to go fast - and so were you.

That's when taper rocks. This morning, taper rocked. This morning, I feel ready.

A Leetle Change of Plans

I'm in the final countdown until my A Race - The Lake St. Louis Long Course (Oly distance) and starting to feel that antsy, anxious, "Oh My God, I Wish I'd Trained More", pre-race buzz. To try to keep it all in perspective, I've spent some time focusing on life "After The Race". It helps me to remember that there will be other mountains to climb and other races to run (or swim bike run).

One of my major Post-Race goals is to run a marathon. The original plan was to do the Space Coast Marathon in Cocoa Village, FL the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, due to financial and time constraints, that is out. However, we've got a fab Plan B. Memphis Marathon and Half Marathon, Dec. 1. We've got our hotel reservations and our training plans. We are psyched. Notice I say we. I'm running the full and Hubby is running the half. In fact, I'm think I'm going to have to start referring to Hubby as Tri-Hubby. He went swimming without me again this morning, is still riding the Blue Hornet to work and - are you ready for this, ladies and gentleman - we just bought him a Trek Alpha SLR 1200 Aero.












Yep. Its a tri bike. Am I a lucky girl, or what? One of the things I fell in love with about Tri-Hubby was his willingness (eagerness even) to try new things, to consider ideas and adventures he'd never considered before. Given the fact that I'm always finding some new rabbit to chase, this is a quality I admire and am incredibly grateful for. I'm looking forward to whatever new adventures await us on our Tri-Journey. Before you know it, we'll have Princess and Boy Genius training with us too!

Meanwhile, LSL looms on the near horizon. And I'm a little askeert. Maybe a lot askeert. I set this goal months ago - because I didn't like hearing people call the Sprint Triathlon, my original goal for this season, a "mini-tri". The sprint didn't seem like a tall enough mountain to climb - and I wanted to climb a mountain. While the Oly is hardly "long distance" compared to what many of you do, for me its certainly sizeable. I'm looking at 3+ hours of racing. And I'm pretty sure I can do it - but I'm not totally sure. I guess that's what makes it my mountain. I know it will also make the finish line, should I be fortunate enough to cross it, that much sweeter. So, I'm breathing deep, I'm trying to trust the training I've put in and I'm letting taper do its thing. Oh. And I'm eating carbs. A lot of carbs. Hopefully, my uniform will still fit.

Finally, I want to give a shout out to those who competed at IM Louisville yesterday, especially my teammates Brad Baum, Kevin Jokish,and Curtis Brooks and my friend Sally, who blazed a sub 12 hour finish! I admire each and every person who toed the line - however the race went for you, you are my heroes!

Things That Make You Go: Hmmmm. . . .

Something very interesting has been happening in the Phoenix household. Something very interesting indeed.

Now, Hubby has always been a runner - a faster runner than me (like that's hard). But he's been doing . . . other things lately.

It started with the occasional bike ride with me. First on Red Molly, then on our newest acquisition, The Blue Hornet, an old Schwinn World road bike we got for $25.00 from a team mate. The Hornet is faster than Molly but still no match for Pyro. Its time to get him a quicker set of wheels. Wish I could afford the Zipp variety - course then I'd be chasin' him down hollerin' "Hey, Wait Up!!"

He ran a couple of road races with me. Then, he came to Master's Swimming with me a couple of times.

But, this week. This week he's riding his bike to and from work. And he got up this morning to go swim - by himself. It was my "sleep in day" (woke up at the languid hour of 6:30 a.m.) and I'm swimming tonight in the final Creve Coeur Open Water Swim of the season. He got up and swam 1500. By. Himself.

Hmmmmm.

So, at the risk of discouraging him by noticing what he's up to, I'm outing him. Hey there, Mr. Triathlete In Training Guy! You know, there's a sprint in October at the Rec Plex. S'posed to be a good one. Race ya.

Finally A Plan Comes Together

I would like to start this post with two of my favorite letters. P. And. R. Baby.

Saturday I ran another 10k, you know, to see what the old girl had in her and, though I didn't place (to my knowledge - they only gave out medals to the top four men and women and the top finishers in each age group), I beat my previous 10k time by almost two minutes: 54:55, avg pace 8:50/mile. Right. On.

Now the original plan for Saturday was to pre-register for the race, get out there as soon as the sun was up and hammer out a 25 mile bike before the race - you know, the perfect race-pace brick. However, I didn't get my entry off in time so pre-registering was out. Plan B was to get out there at the crack of dawn and hammer out an hour as hard as I could go - and hopefully get in close to 20 miles. Also didn't happen. Hubby came along and raced the 5k (He also PRd - GO HUBBY! I theorize that he was in the top three in his age group but, unless they post the results as they promised, we won't know) and came along on the bike. Alas, his bike is just not as fast as Pyro and, though he told me I should leave him behind, I just couldn't. I mean, a guy gets up at 4:30 a.m. on a Saturday to ride with you and then run a road race - you don't just leave him in your dust. The up side was that we found a really beautiful road to ride - it was flat and smooth and skirted the edge of the bluff for the entire way (though, I noticed on the way back that the speed limit was 55 - there wasn't a lot of traffic but they were going pretty fast - not sure that's the best route for future trips). The down side was that we got in just under 12 miles in 50 min. Not exactly the hammer fest I'd planned - still, it was a ride and it was a nice warm up for my legs and, hey, I can't complain about a PR, now can I?

So, in the end, Saturday was all good. Which leads us to Sunday. The last couple of weeks, I've seemed to have a hard time executing my plans. Sometimes the weather gets in the way, once it was Pyro's gears going all wanky, sometimes I've just felt "off", other times its just been circumstances (see above). Life is like that, as I'm sure you all know. Still, its been frustrating to the point that I'd started to believe that planning was just futile and to really fear that I would not be adequately prepared for my A race in just under two weeks. Thankfully, yesterday put at least some of those feelings to rest.

Lake St. Louis schedules two practice swims on the two Sundays preceding the race. Being new to open water, there is no way I was going to miss out on that opportunity. Yesterday's plan was to get in the water at 7:00, the earliest possible start time, knock out the 1500 then do the bike course twice. That's fifty miles - longer than I've ever ridden before (40 was my previous record). Maybe too big a jump, but I wanted to have the confidence that I could more than handle this course and I knew that riding it twice in a row would give that to me.

As soon as I arrived, I met one of my blog-land buddies - Tryan. He doesn't have a blog (yet) but he's posted comments here and there and we've shot some emails back and forth. How cool to be looking around at all these people, feeling like a totally clueless newb, absolutely out of place, and finding a friend. Thanks, Tryan! We chatted a bit then headed for the water.

Someone had stolen the first buoy during the night so they sent a kayaker to the far shore where the buoy was supposed to be. He looked so small in the distance. I took a deep breath (or 50) and reminded myself that I'd swam further than this course out at Creve Coeur, it was just compacted into laps so you couldn't see how far you'd actually gone. Tryan just jumped in and started - he's much braver and faster than I! After standing in the water (which was perfect, by the way - I felt sorry for those who thought they needed wetsuits, they missed out) and gathering my courage for a bit, I started out. I had decided that I was just going to cruise the course, just get a feel and see how long my "cruise speed" would take me, then make a decision about what my race pace should be. Based on Creve Coeur times, I figured it would take between 40 and 45 minutes. So I cruised to kayak, then buoy after buoy until, before I knew it, I was heading for shore. I went off course a bit in the last stretch when I misunderstood what a fireman on the course told us about which buoy to aim for (its really hard to hear with a swim cap on). I ended up somewhere between 50 and 100 meters off and a kayaker was kind enough to point out the two buoys we were supposed to swim between. But, it was cool. I never felt tired and rarely felt anything close to fear, so that was all good. And my time: 37:40! Sahweet! I have to give props to the Lake St. Louis Fire Department and the volunteers out there on kayaks - those folks were everywhere! I got out of the water feeling great and ready to tackle the bike. I saw Tryan again in the parking lot, he was heading out for the course and invited me to ride with him but I wanted to get my packet at City Hall (which was along the course) and then ride out from there so we parted ways until I saw him at City Hall after my first loop. He did the whole course, including the run, in around 2:30! For a practice! Dang, he is going to kick some butt in the race.

About half way through my first loop, I just knew I couldn't make a second. I had come down what seemed to be the biggest hill of the course and I knew I was going to have to go back up it. And my legs felt like toast. So, I started the second half of the first loop fully intending to call it quits after one. Then, I got to the "monster hill". There was a chick in front of me who was obviously more skilled on the bike than I - she was in aero almost constantly while I didn't get down even once - we both started the hill together and I groaned "here we go" to which she grunted her reply. Then. I passed her. Like she was tied to a frickin post (thanks 21st Century Mom, for that expression). That's when I knew that I would do the whole fifty. The whole hilly, painful fifty. And I did. The second loop was much harder than the first, but I did it. All told, the ride took 3:25. Not horrible for the amount of hills and the fact that, while I pushed it at times, I wasn't "racing" the course. Finally, a plan comes together.