The Great Escape

So it appears that I have a few minutes to update the blog while Moana continues her morning nap. Seems like we've finally outgrown the 3-nap-per-day schedule and have moved onto the 2-nap-per-day schedule. The books I read said that should have happened like a month ago, but my little angel daughter was turning into Ms. CrankyPants if she was awake for more than 2 hours at a stretch so it seemed I was always putting her down for a nap. It's still kind of a guessing game for me trying to figure out exactly when she should go down (based upon when she last ate, when I think she's going to want to eat again, when she last woke up, how long the last nap was, etc) but currently I'm just basing it on when she just starts to get a little grumpy. It worked this morning. She started making the I'm-Tired-Grunting noises around 9:45 so I carried her up to her crib, where she gave one little yell out and then turned her head to the side and dozed off. Easiest nap time EVER.

I'm a fan of the longer naps too. This morning was awesome- I got home from running and played with her for a while, then while she's napping I had time to get on my trainer for an hour, shower, make lunch, clean the kitchen, throw in a load of laundry, and update the blog. What was Allison saying on FB about trying to cram it all in while baby is napping? That's what moms do I think!! :)

Moana has totally become the little escape artist lately. She isn't a fan of being strapped into her bouncy chair and protests by arching her back a bunch trying to break out. But without being strapped in, this is what happens.





It does seem that she prefers to be on the floor these days rather than in her chair. Not that she's making an effort to crawl or anything. Or even roll over. She can totally do it if she wants to, but she just seems pretty content to stay in one place a lot. I probably shouldn't complain about this because one of these days I'm gonna be updating this blog with crazy stories of chasing her around the house and babyproofing everything... or maybe then I won't have time to update the blog at all because of all the chasing her around. But so far I've just got a little girl who's perfectly content to hang out and look around, even though clearly she is strong enough to move if she ever actually tried.

WOW!

Ooohh how cool I get to finally write a triathlon race report! First one for me since... Ironman '07... and first one since... giving birth to Moana!

It was just a little sprint this morning... 750 swim, 12 mile bike, 3.6 mile run. I showed up and I swear I wasn't the least bit nervous about the swim/bike/run part... but wasn't sure I'd remember how to get through a transition in decent time. Sure enough, I got smoked in both transitions, but hey... whatever.

It was cold and windy this morning (what's new, eh?) and even though I was under strict instructions to get in a good warm up, I only managed to jog for about 10 minutes and swim for like, a minute. Not like I was gonna actually get 'warm' in that cold water anyway... that was my rationalization... sorry, Jen! The water was actually cold enough to make it 'wetsuit legal' but no one bothered with a wetsuit.

I lined up near the front with Rachel, Kathryn, and Stefan. Rachel said Stefan was wicked fast in the water... I'd never swam (swum? swimmed?) with him before but given Rachel's description I was pretty sure I wasn't going to be able to hang with him. Imagine how pleasantly surprised I was when after a couple minutes I could see him off to my right and we were swimming stroke for stroke! I'm no dummy... I slowed down a bit and just tucked in his draft... tapped his toes for much of the rest of the swim (sorry, Stefan!!). It was great though because he just led me directly from buoy to buoy and all of a sudden we were running up the beach towards our bikes. Kathryn was, of course, just ahead of us.

Transition? Yah, not so much. I fumbled with my helmet for a while and by the time I was getting on my bike at the line, Rachel had already gone by. That was cool though- my super-secret goal was to see if I could keep her in sight for the short ride after she inevitably passed me. I had no idea how realistic this was because Rachel and I haven't trained at all together this year... so again, imagine my very pleasant surprise when I managed to stay just a couple of bike lengths behind her for the whole ride! We picked our way through the majority of the men's field up ahead and arrived into T2 together. WOW!

Getting off the bike I almost felt like my goal had been accomplished because I had no illusions of being able to run with Rachel... but again, after another slow transition, I started off on the run. I worked as hard as I could just trying to maintain my second place. In all honesty I don't remember too much of the run... just trying to put one foot in front of other and not trip over myself I suppose... I went as fast as my little feet would take me and for the first time ever, no women passed me on the run. That's another really big WOW!

So, first race back... second place overall... Though in all honesty, it's hard to be really proud of the placing because most of the fast local gals were on the Big Island racing Lavaman today. I *so* wish I could have gone and raced there this year but family responsibility and lack of funds made that unrealistic.

So the Blogger Chicks ruled the day today at the Waterfront Triathlon! And I suspect that if you pop on over to Rachel's blog later you might find this same photo along with her version of today's events. What a fun way to start the tri season... :)

Small Craft Advisory

The newest addition to the weekly workout routine is the Friday Sunrise Ocean swim. We meet at the boat ramp in Kailua and after a warm-up out to Flat Island and back, do intervals along the buoy line. It is hard to deny how awesome it is to be out in the ocean as the sun is cresting the horizon and turning those little clouds pink.

Last week there were just 3 of us. This morning the group ballooned to eight brave souls who faced that cold water.

You all know how much I complained about our ch-ch-ch-chilly winter... so even though now it is starting to feel more like spring, the ocean is still BRRRRR. So I pretend that I need to practice using my wetsuit, which is funny beause I'm not actually doing any wetsuit legal triathlons this year. But whatever. It's always good to practice in the thing, no?

Even with my wetsuit on, I still end up feeling like an ice cube and my hands go all numb and I have to blast the heat until I feel like I'm gonna suffocate in my car on the way home. But that wasn't the biggest issue we had this morning. No, the issue this morning was the Small Craft Advisory issued for the east shores of Oahu. For those of you who are wondering, "What is a Small Craft Advisory?" Here is your answer, direct from the National Weather Service:

A SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY MEANS THAT WIND SPEEDS OF 25 TO 33 KNOTS AND/OR SEAS 10 FEET OR GREATER ARE EXPECTED TO PRODUCE CONDITIONS HAZARDOUS TO SMALL CRAFT. INEXPERIENCED MARINERS...ESPECIALLY THOSE OPERATING SMALLER VESSELS...SHOULD AVOID NAVIGATING IN THESE CONDITIONS.

This guy had the better idea.

These are kinds of windy conditions that (these days) cause race directors to cancel swim races, or change a triathlon into a duathlon at the last minute*. Standing on the beach this morning, I wasn't the only one wondering if maybe we shouldn't go. But you know what? We didn't have a race director calling out any cancellations. And this was my only chance today to swim. So off we went.

Lesson learned this morning? WE ARE SMALL CRAFT.

Should have been advised. Ok, we were advised. We should have listened to the advice. Or not. As crazy windy as it was, it was still doable. And the more we swim in chop like that, the better we get at it. But salt water never really tastes better, no matter how much you inhale.

*GRRRRRRRRR to the Honolulu Triathlon directors if they're really gonna turn that race into a duathlon just because of forcasted jellyfish that weekend. Take away my swim and make me run instead? GRRRRRR again.

Growing Up

Moana seems so much older to me every day. And taller. I haven't measured her lately, but I have stored away several pairs of pajamas that don't allow her to straighten out her legs anymore. And she can touch her feet to the ground when she's in her Jumperoo now. I really should measure her height, because even though she seems so tall to me now, this is still the shortest she will ever be.

And shoot, now that she's reading and all...

Yesterday morning I went in to check on her and found her sleeping on her side. With her favorite blankie (Thanks, Auntie Andrea!) and dollie (Thanks, Auntie Catharine!).
I'd never seen her so far over on her side before. I figured it was just a matter of time before she rolled herself all the way over onto her tummy.

In fact, it was just one day. This morning Scott went in to check on her and came back to report that she was fully on her tummy! I'd heard that babies do this at some point and that once they roll themselves over then it's ok, right? I'm actually sort of surprised that she was ok sleeping on her tummy because when I put her on her tummy during the day she always insists on having her head so far up that she can't relax at all... then eventually gets all grumpy and wants to be back on her back. But whatever floats her boat.

In other news, I'm supposed to go in the the doctor's office to get routine labs done sometime soon. I was going to go this morning since I'm not training until later (this would have been the best morning) but totally forgot and started drinking the yummy french press coffee that my awesome husband brought to me in bed this morning... It's a fasting blood test which just seems impossible to me because I don't fast. Ever. I eat. All the time. I guess one morning next week I'm going to have to just suck it up and do it. But seriously, delaying breakfast is like torture for me. I have no idea how people skip breakfast in the morning?

Got Poi?

Moana is going to be five months old this week. I know. I can't believe it either!

Lately she's been expressing a lot of interest in eating stuff other than milk. Like, elephants, for example.

Or Sting Rays. Any of you moms out there who have a Jumperoo know how tasty the Sting Ray must be.

It also appears that any food out on the counter is of interest. Tomatoes sure are colorful and appealing.

Ooooooh... or green leaf lettuce!

So even though I know she doesn't really need any nutrition from solid food until she's closer to 6 months, I thought, what the heck... lets' see if she wants to try to eat a little food off of a spoon. And I've heard that Poi is a good food for babies... a traditional Hawaiian food (like pudding but not nearly as tasty) made from taro root, it is nutritionally dense and apparently no one is allergic to it.

Let's see if Moana likes it.

I don't think Moana is actually opposed to poi, but she really didn't quite know what to do with that spoon. She's still got that tongue reflex where anything foreign in her mouth gets spit right back out. We've tried a couple of times now and she's swallowed some of it, but for the most part, poi just ends up all over her bib. So I think we're gonna wait a little longer on the solid foods.

Two Gold Medals

Well now you know how it ends, so you only have to keep reading this blog post if you're curious about the details. ;)

Mama was pretty darn nervous this morning... riding over to the Team Time Trial I tried to calm myself down, but I swear my anxiety level was higher today than it will probably be all year. There's something about working as a team that makes me way more nervous than when I'm just doing something for myself. Like seriously, no one really cares about how I perform individually, but when there's a team of people counting on me to perform for a team result... well that leads to high anxiety!

Anyway, we got our team kits in yesterday, so we were looking sharp this morning. Actually, these are our tri kits... the road kits haven't arrived yet so we had permission to ride sleeveless today. ;)

This was the only picture I got from the day, because after this, it was all business. The girls team warmed up and decided on our order and some strategy, etc. Our race started and we had a nice build into our pace, but in all honesty, it felt pretty darn easy to me. When I was at the front I was working some, but wasn't killing myself until we got more toward the end. There was a nice cross/tail wind pushing us out to the turn around... a wind that we had to fight really hard coming home. More than once it occurred to me that our training days are way harder than this, and with something like 4 miles to go, my competitive side came out. In some sort of freak militaristic show (I swear I don't know where this came from?), I barked out something along the lines of the following: "OK LADIES, THIS IS NOT A TRAINING DAY. THIS IS A RACE. AND WE HAVE ABOUT 10 MINUTES LEFT. TIME TO WORK. ITS GONNA HURT. MAKE IT HURT. GO GO GO!!!!"

I knew we actually had more than 10 minutes left, but what the heck. I said 10 minutes because it made it seem like we were almost there. I proceeded to go to the front and put in a big solid effort. Apparently my ranting scared one of the gals, because by the time I pulled off, she was off the back. No big deal because we only needed to finish with three to make it count... I continued barking cheerleading efforts at my teammates and we all danced with that red line called Threshold until the red line called Finish Line appeared off in the distance. Then we sprinted. Official finish 1:04:44, good enough for first place in the woman's division. Great job Ladies!!

Phew. Glad that was done. I had just enough time to roll maybe a quarter mile down the road before I turned around, pedaled back to the start line, grabbed my other water bottle from a guy who fetched it for me, and heard 90 seconds 'til your start! 90 seconds... that's about how much time I had between contractions when I was giving birth to Moana. No problem.

Or... Holy crap.

It's probably good that I had such a tiny amount of rest between events because I had no time to even start to contemplate what I was about to do.

My next team involved Cat 1 Guy, Tai, and Motorpace (the one guy I knew and have been training with). The plan was that Cat 1 Guy and Tai would trade off pulls while Motorpace would sit on, close any gaps that would form, and yell at the front two to pick it up (HA! Like that would ever be my instruction!) or slow it down, based upon my legs. My job was to not lose Motorpace's wheel, while also communicating with him how I was doing.

One thing I forgot to mention is that Cat 1 guy flatted in the first few miles of his 'A' race, so he was totally fresh. We actually saw him sitting by the side of the road as we (girls) rode by and my only thought was, "Oh no! He's not even gonna be tired!"

As it turned out, it was good that Cat 1 Guy wasn't tired, because Tai flatted in the first few miles of that Mixed Team race. So now it was just Cat 1 Guy pulling and Motorpace protecting me. And I swear, it's good I don't have a computer on my bike and wasn't wearing a HR monitor, because I'm sure had I seen the numbers for the first few miles of that race I just would have quit right on the spot. I was instantly at red line and we had to have been going 30 mph (with the tailwind).

Obviously my comments to Motorpace involved something like, "I can't do this..." so he yelled up at Cat 1 Guy to back it off. That was pretty much the story of the first half of the race... me yelling "Ease up!" every once in a while as Cat 1 Guy inevitably built up the effort. We were flying with that tailwind. I actually wasn't so worried about my heart rate or breathing... it was more that my quads were on the verge of cramping and I knew it so I was trying to meter my effort so I didn't just completely seize up and have to stop all together.

We hit the turn around in less than 28 minutes (what is that, like 26 mph??) and then faced the wicked headwind to come home. Luckily this slowed Cat 1 Guy some and since I was protected and had been monitoring my effort, I felt okay. So rather than yelling "Ease up" on the way home, I was saying, "I'm okay." That felt good.

Last night my friend Nalani sent me text that said, "I hope you impress yourself tomorrow." Indeed. I remembered that text and smiled. Yes, I was impressing myself.

Last mile... bigger effort... now it's Motorpace's turn to be the cheerleader, urging me to give it everything... I didn't exactly have a sprint left, but I hung right in there for the finish in 1:01:03. Nice. Good enough for another first place, but that was just in our age division. We got beat by two other Mixed teams.

All I wanted at the finish was some water. I'd been dry since before the turn-around... Then, in true Tri-Geek fashion, I had my running shoes on within a few minutes and was off for a little jog with Amy. She was very patient with me as my quads were completely seizing up on me with every step. I had to walk it off a little, but prior experience told me it was possible to get through this transition cramping... sure enough, within about ten minutes the cramping was gone and I was good to go. We didn't go too long or too fast, but it was good for me to find out how my legs would react to running after an effort like that on the bike. My experience today told me that I need to be more careful about my nutrition and hydration during these hard efforts. It also taught me that my training partners are awesome and that what we do every Saturday works, because the pain I felt today was not much different from what we experience on a weekly basis.

A ten mile easy spin home and I called it a day. A fun day with the team! Success! :)

69 Minutes

I just got home from packet pick-up for the 40K Team Time Trial(s) I'm doing tomorrow. I go off with the women at 8:33 AM and then the mixed team goes at... wait for it... 9:42.

For those of you who are math challenged, that leaves me a total of 69 minutes to complete the first TT, recover, and start the second one. Given that two years ago the TTT on this hyper-windy course took us 65 minutes, that oughtta give me a good 4 minutes to bring my heart rate down, go pee, and swap out my water bottles before heading back out there to chase the fast men.

The thought of that just makes me laugh. Who am I kidding? That's insane.

Driving home I just had to change my thinking... I am not racing two 40K's tomorrow... I decided to think of it more like a 1/2 Ironman. I've done lots of half ironmans. So really, it won't be that hard. I mean, I don't even have to do the whole 56 miles because 80K is only like 50 miles. And they're totally gonna let me cheat and draft the whole way. And the 4 minute break I get half way through will be like standing down in the penalty box (because of all the drafting).

HA!

So just for good measure, I'll be packing my running shoes. Because there's no better practice for running after you're thrashed from a hard ride than when you're actually thrashed from a hard ride.