Go Big or Go Home

Moana's new thing right now is to nonchalantly say, "ok" instead of yes when you ask her a question.

Moana, do you want some milk?

Ok.

Moana, do you want to read a book?

Ok.

Moana, do you want to go to the playground?

Ok.

It cracks me up! I didn't think that Scott and I answer 'ok' a lot, but we must.

At the playground, she likes to go big or go home. Here she is asking to hang on the high bars.

I think it's funny that her arms don't reach up much past her head even when fully extended. My arms are so long... my elbows are above my head when I reach straight up.

So, speaking of saying 'ok'... I said ok the other night when a swimmer friend called and asked if I wanted to be on their relay team for the Maui Channel Swim! Let me tell you, I didn't exactly think it through before answering in the affirmative... but regardless, I'm IN! I think it's gonna be a blast! I'm going to be on a relay team with three guys from California and two guys from here. I only know one of them, but whatever. I'm all about making new friends. :) The six of us will share the duty of swimming from Lanai to Maui. It's 9ish miles and takes 3-8 hours depending on the currents. I'm actually coaching a local swimmer who will be crossing the channel solo on the same day (that's one way to celebrate your 50th birthday I guess!) so it'll be sweet to be there on the beach to give her a hug when she finishes.

I say I didn't really think it through because now that we are planning out the logistics of the weekend I'm wondering how I'm actually going to do it all? You see, the Maui Channel swim is the Saturday of Labor day weekend. Which would be fine, except that the next day, Sunday, is the big 'around the island' 112 mile bike race that I'm planning on doing... so the bummer is that I will not be able to stay for the banquet after the Channel Swim- instead I'll have to fly back to Oahu Saturday night and then see if I have time to sleep at all because the bike race starts at 5:45 AM on Sunday morning. Perfect. I think I can do the two events back to back.

But then Monday morning, Labor day, is the annual Waikiki RoughWater Swim! 2.4 miles. It's the Queen of the summer ocean swims around here. Super competitive. People fly in from the mainland and Australia for this race. Last year Macca did it and, get this, got third in his age group! (That just sort of made me laugh.) And then I saw this on facebook today...

It's an article from 1976 about the Roughwater swim that year, won by none other than the guy, Brett, who Nalani and I are swimming with now! Too funny. Turns out Brett was the overall winner of the swim 3 times, first in the year I was born. Lol. This article talks about how he beat professional triathlete Dave Scott that year.

Anyway, looks like Labor Day weekend is going to be a 'Go Big or Go Home' kind of weekend. Am I game? Ok.

Welcome Back

So this morning was my first swim back... I mean, I've been swimming regularly, but half-heartedly. Today was the first time in quite some time where I showed up with my game face on and ready to be aggressive and actually swim well. (Especially unique given that it is a Monday morning!) That swim race on Saturday was still at the forefront of my mind and I had just finally reached the point where I was DONE being complacent in the water.

From my first stroke this morning I could tell that it was going to be a good day. Not that physically I felt a whole lot different. It's not like I am more rested today then I have been on any other day... but mentally I could feel that I was back. I had that aggressive feeling in both my head and my heart and was ready to have a good swim.

How may times have I blogged about deciding that you're going to be fast today? Or about how you're faster than you think? I had a good reminder of that for myself this morning. I am continually amazed at what a large part our brains play. I think part of the problem for me is that I've been swimming with Nalani and Mark and Brett, three very fast swimmers. And somewhere along the line I'd made the decision that they were all faster than me... so when they would swim ahead, I just accepted it.

Today I decided that they were not faster than me. Nope. I decided that I am just as fast as them. (Ok, not as fast as Brett. He is a genetic freak who is like 8 feet tall and more naturally talented than most humans but I am ruining my point here so let's not focus on Brett. Lol.)

Our main set today was 300 steady, 150 FAST, 50 easy, x2, on pretty tight intervals. (Or what I thought were going to be pretty tight intervals for me.) But I was aggressive even in the 300 steady and came in about 10 seconds ahead of where I would have last week. Awesome. Right into a 150 FAST. At the 100 I looked across the pool to see how far ahead Nalani was, and um, was that her behind me?? No way. Change your mindset, Michelle. You are FAST. Dig and GO!

Can I just say that I haven't beat Nalani to the wall in any fast swim in like, probably 10 months?? I'm telling you, it's all in our heads. And then I did it again on the second set.

And there's nothing not to LOVE about Nalani. As we were walking into the locker room after the swim she said, "You know, I'm sorry you didn't have a great swim on Saturday, but if that's what it took to light your fire, then I'm glad it happened. Welcome back."

Indeed. It feel good to be back. :)

I'm Gonna Have To Put My Game Face On

Today was the second swim of the North Shore Swim Series races... 4 ocean swims that serve to satisfy our craving to race in swimming. This is my sixth year doing the series and I absolutely love it. Unfortunately, I missed the first race this year because I was in Tex-ASS.

I'm sitting here feeling a bit dissatisfied (an understatement) about my result today so that's my warning to you about this post. (Also, I'm finishing my second beer. So you know this will be straight from the heart. Lol. What is that rule about not drinking and blogging?*)

So the truth is, I've been taking my swimming for granted. I swim pretty well. I know I am not the fastest SWIMMER swimmer, but I am fast enough for triathlon and have probably become a bit complacent as of late. I should know better, but it is what it is and my eyes were opened today. I mean, my eyes are open every M-W-F morning when I show up at the pool and get my butt kicked by Nalani and our two ex-collegiate swimmer guys, but I've become so accustomed to being the 'slow' one at swim practice that I've just come to expect to be beaten by them so most of the time I just do my thing and hope to make the interval (which I always do because, um, I am the one who picks the intervals.)

Anyway, about today... you know, because of this whole complacency thing, I did not give a second thought to this race this morning. I didn't think about it all week. I didn't cut back on any other workouts because of it. I didn't wear my TYR speed suit **. I'm not telling you this to make an excuse for why I lost today, but just to give you some insight into my errors. I made the mistake of thinking that I could just show up and win my age group. I knew that uber-swimmer Miki turned 40 this year (phew! She beat me every swim last year- I was 2nd, 4x), and I knew that there is another gal in my age group who is pretty fast, but she hasn't beaten me in a couple of years so I was not particularly worried about her. I swear, and I am embarrassed to admit this, but I just ASSumed that I was going to win my age group. And you know what they say about people who ASSume.

So I warmed up well this morning and when the horn went off I sprinted. I found myself some feet and felt like I worked pretty hard to stay on them. I didn't look up and sight a lot, but again, I was on this gal's feet and it seemed to me that she was a competent swimmer so I let her do the sighting. I ASSumed she was doing a fine job because every once in a while she would do a couple of breast-stroke strokes for some extra sighting. Fine. I stayed on her feet. My stroke felt long and strong and I felt good so I ASSumed that the reason there were so few swimmers around us was that we were just swimming faster than most of the others. Lol.

I wondered briefly if this gal I was drafting off of was in my age group. She did not look like a young gal to me but I couldn't really see her that well. I just knew I did not know her. This is a small island and though most of us know each other, that doesn't mean that new people don't move in... but honestly, as we were approaching the finish, I felt no urge or desire to try to sprint by her or run by her up the beach. I just didn't really care. She beat me by 3 seconds.

That is not like me.

But whatever. I ran up the beach and crossed the timing mat and then saw 2 gals I knew standing there and was immediately a bit disappointed. If they were standing there, that meant they'd already finished, which means they beat me. Not taking anything away from these two gals, because they are good swimmers... but on a good day, well, I would expect to be ahead of them. That's all. So I thought I was swimming well, but clearly not as well as I thought I was.

Oh well.

I checked the results. Um. Ok. The gal I was drafting off of was indeed in my age group. And, um, she was third. Oh my. I hope this doesn't come across like I am a sore loser. I don't see it that way. I did my best today. I got beat fair and square. BUT 4th in my age group is not an acceptable result for me at these races. The only other time in 6 years that I have placed 4th in my age group I was 7 months pregnant!

I swear, I tried not to let it bother me... But then I had 3.5 hours on my bike (into a stiff headwind most of the time) and I spent that time beating myself up for my fourth place finish. Why do I suck at swimming now? That was my main thought.

But the truth is, I don't suck at swimming. HOWEVER, there are some other (new) fast gals here in my age group now. I checked the results and the gal I drafted off of today lives in the next town over and posted a good result at the first swim two weeks ago. Ok good. So the fact of the matter is that I'm going to have to put my game face on for these races if I want to place better in the next two. Perfect. I needed some motivation. I needed a swift kick in the butt. And I got it today. So now it's GAME ON. I am going to SWIM. And I will show up at the next race with a better mindset and will be ready to race! Perfect.

*Scott said the rule is 'not more than 3 beers before blogging', so I'm good.

**Nalani said that wearing a speed suit at these races would be like wearing a ball gown to a BBQ so we just didn't do it. Nor did most of our competitors.

Combining Work and Play... Or... In Praise Of Beach Park Showers

I was just telling a friend today that I'm feeling pretty good this week about the life I've created for myself. As long as I'm not traveling, I feel like I've been able to strike a pretty good balance between being a mom, a wife, an athlete, a coach, and a saleswoman. It just takes a little prior planning (and beach park showers) to fit it all in.

Take today, for example. My plan was to call on a couple of restaurants up on the north shore... but I also wanted to fit in a bike ride that included a couple of long aerobic climbing efforts... and since there's a great 25-30 minute climb up there, I knew that would be the best place to do it. So after dropping Moana off at day care, I packed my bike, helmet, shoes, sunglasses, nutrition, work clothes, shampoo, towel, make-up bag, and coffee samples into my car and headed north.

I know I write about riding hard a lot, but the truth is, I do believe in aerobic base riding. And climbing easy. And I do it, quite often. I just don't normally write about it because it's boring. I've found that in order to force myself to ride easy, I need to arrange a couple of things beforehand. #1 I have to go alone. Forget training partners on your easy days. People always say they're going to go easy but human nature, in most cases, takes over and it's never as easy as it should be. #2 Wear a HR monitor and stick to your zones. OR #3 Do NOT look at your watch and attempt to time yourself in any way. I used to time myself on my easy days just for fun, or just so I'd know how slow easy pace really is, but inevitably I'd end up pushing the pace a bit in an effort not to see a slow time on my watch. So yeah, I don't do that anymore.

So today I was all set to climb easy up Pineapple Hill. I was riding alone. I did NOT look at my watch at the bottom of the hill. I forgot to pack my HR monitor this morning but I think I know what easy feels like and given that I had two of my three rules covered, I figured I'd be fine. And I was. The effort up the hill was perfect. I don't know how long it took. It doesn't matter. :) I cruised down the hill to finish the loop and began the climb again.

And then I saw him. Uh oh.

Some random rider up ahead of me on the climb. The self talk began. Do not go catch him, Michelle. You do not care about that guy. Just ride your own easy pace... etc. It would have worked too, except that guy ahead of me was slow. I was catching him. Oh well. Make a swift pass and maybe he'll let you go and that'll be that. So I passed him. And then you know what happened.

So this guy picks up his pace because heaven forbid he get passed by a girl. He jumped on my wheel as I rode by. Keep your effort easy, I tell myself. Ok, so the guy decides that he can now push harder so he passes me back. Control yourself, Michelle. Let him go. You do not care about this guy. Do NOT ruin your ride because of your ego. So I let him go. But you know that after about 1 minute this guy started to poop out and come back to me.

This is exactly what I was trying to avoid, but here I was, riding back and forth with this guy who thought it would be fun to push the pace beyond his capabilities. I knew that if I just rode tempo for like 2-3 minutes I could drop him and be done with it, but I stuck to my plan and just cruised. About 10 minutes later we face a steeper pitch of the hill and wouldn't you know it? This guy, who had been sitting on my wheel, rides by huffing and puffing and stands up to propel himself ahead of me on this part. Are you serious? Ugh. Once again, I let him go. But I would be lying if I said I was not annoyed by this point. But I stuck to my pace.

That was, until 'Pump Up The Jam' came on my iPod. I'm sorry, but I just could not help myself any longer. I'd controlled myself for most of the hill but I was done controlling myself. I didn't jump up and attack or anything, but I imagined I was wearing one of Julie's "I Drop Boys" jerseys and pumped up the jam until I caught him, and then rode right by. Guess who did not jump on my wheel this time? A few minutes later I crested the top of the hill and glanced back. Guess who was not even in sight? Make my day.



Back down the hill and to my car which was parked at a beach park with facilities to help working athletes like myself...



10 minutes later I was showered and dressed and ready to go sell some coffee. Love those beach park showers.

Ride Like A Triathlete

I can see why I may need to go back to having my own coach.

I was really good at setting my own program for myself (and following it!) all spring leading up to Honu. But then since Honu I've been feeling like I'm floundering a bit, which is fine, really. For now anyway. My problem isn't that I don't do the training. My problem is that, without a structured plan, I do too much of it. Or too much of it too hard.

This weekend was a prime example of that. The Saturday group ride was flat out fast and hard. And long. Then I took off running yesterday with kind of a plan in my head about how far/fast I was going to go... of course it ended up being far and then I started picking up the pace coming home and eventually I just turned it into a progression run with a fast finish. All well and good until I get to today's hammerfest and I'm doing everything I can to hang on and my legs are just screaming at me and my HR is through the roof... I guess it's fine as long as I take a couple of easy days to recover now. But a good plan keeps you from doing this kind of stuff to yourself in the first place, you know?

(I know that. Really, I do. I just don't care to do it right now.)

Today was actually quite interesting. I got a call a few days ago from a guy who wanted a "personal triathlon coach for the weekend". What? I've never really heard of such a thing. But shoot. I'm game! Turns out, we weren't actually able to meet up until this morning. I gotta tell you though, I was overwhelmingly curious about what kind of person would hire a "personal triathlon coach for the weekend"... I knew his name and that he was visiting from NYC... which is enough for google. Lets just say that I felt a bit nervous when I found his profile on Forbes.com. I'm not sure I really know how to relate to anyone who has a profile on Forbes.com?

But triathlon brings people together in a unique way and it turns out I was able to relate just fine. Though I should have known that he would show up completely decked out with his top of the line TT bike and aero helmet and 808's. Duh. Maybe I should have unpacked my TT bike after all? I was on my road bike and, well, after we took off at what felt like 90 mph down the road, I was wishing I had my P3 instead. This guy was flying. I guess a guy like him doesn't know how to give anything short of everything... I did think it was a bit ironic that he was paying me to sit on his wheel, but, whatever. He said he wanted someone to push him so I just did so verbally, from behind, uttering things like, "nice job" during the rare moments when I could get a breath. Then we took off running. I was thinking that maybe I should just ride my bike beside him while he ran, but he wasn't having any of that... so there I was, huffing and puffing and chasing this guy around Diamond Head... kind of comical. All I could think was that this was such a triathlete way to train. The Just go as hard as you can for as long as you can mentality.

Anyway, it appears that he enjoyed the training session because he said he would call me again next time he comes into town. Next time I'll shave and taper so I can better survive the Triathlete Training Day. Lol.

Ride Like A Roadie

All spring, Saturday mornings meant pretty much one thing... long brick. I have a group that I ride with... starts near my house... a bunch of strong triathletes riding on a relatively flat windy road... lots of aero bar time... steady state stuff. It's a fast ride, but not like 100% all out sprinting fast, but it's never easy. Done riding? Go for your run.

Those rides served me very well for the triathlon racing I did all spring. But now, looking at my calendar, my triathlon races are pretty much over for 2010. Well, I'll likely do the Rev3 at Cedar Point in Sept, but that's pretty much it.

Looking at my calendar, it's clear that it's time for me to switch gears a bit. Literally. I'm going to be doing some bike racing on the road in the next few months! Fun stuff. But if you've ever done bike racing, you know that most races are decided by who can get up the hills the fastest. BIke racing is not about steady state riding and conserving energy for the run. It's about sprinting and attacking and climbing as hard as you can and trying to crack your competitors. Yeah, a little different training is going to be required this summer...

With that in mind, I put my road bike in my car this morning and drove into town to join another local cycling team for their Saturday ride. I knew some of the guys there but it has been probably 3-4 years since I've ridden with them, so there were lots of new faces too. None of them were triathletes. All roadies.

Roadies ride differently than triathletes do. It's all about slow/very fast rather than steady consistent speeds. It's really a completely different type of training. And these guys actively seek out hills. Big ones. Steep ones. And they ride up them as hard as they can. Perfect. Exactly what I wanted today. Except for the wind and the rain. It was ugly out today. But of course I stuck with my belief that you train in whatever conditions are presented to you... because when we race... well you know how that goes. Anyway...

Since my goal was to just crush myself today, I rode the first hill quite hard. It was the longest one of the day was about a 15 minute effort. I hung with a little group of 4... then we were a little group of 3... then I cracked and watched the other 2 ride away. I knew we would regroup at the top so all was ok. Good solid effort that left me physically shaking at the top. Down the other side of the mountain, through a tunnel that was literally a wind tunnel... flying down, unable to see because I was being pelted by the driving rain and my glasses were all fogged up... my least favorite part of the day by far but we made it to the bottom safely and then continued the hammerfest. I swear, up every little incline these guys would just HAMMER and I would grit my teeth and do everything I could to hang on. I could not hang with the fastest guys but I found a few in the chase group that were more my level so I hung in there with them and worked my tail off. So it went. For like 75 miles. I did what I could to recover recover recover between climbing efforts... took myself to my 'crampy place' and almost succumbed to full on leg cramps but managed to back off the effort in time to save myself from literally being forced to just lay down on the side of the road.

This was clearly the hardest ride I have done all year. Maybe in 2 years. It's just so different than how we normally train, but in a good fun way! I like being tactical. I like pushing it all out and testing myself truly to the limit. I don't think I could train like that every weekend or I'd be completely burnt out, but every once in a while, it's fun to go ride like a roadie. Unfortunately, my legs set themselves on fire every time I climb the stairs... and just watching the Tour prologue this afternoon made them burn...

It's Hard To Do It All

Phew. I am glad this week is over. I feel like the last 3 days have just been a whirlwind and Mama needs a break. That's the biggest problem with travel, isn't it? You have a great time while you're gone, but then you have to come home (and I won't go into the nightmare of travel that can entail) and everything you were supposed to be doing is still right there, waiting to be done, but now you just have less time to do it all. That's how this week went.

Suffice to say that my bike is still sleeping peacefully in its box and shall remain there for time unspecified. Hey, at least it finally showed up here at my house. 2 days late is better than lost completely. And at some point I'll unpack my suitcase. Really, I will. I unzipped it the other day and saw that the glass french press I took with me was shattered so there was broken glass all over. Rather than dealing with it, I zipped that suitcase right back up and left it there. Does tell you anything about my personality? Maybe when I open it up again the glass will be magically gone? I know. Not likely. But I need to have a different mindset before I can clean all that up.

Anyway, in good news, I made a positive change with my coaching business this week. I've recently gotten calls from several more athletes who want coaching, which is great, but I was feeling overwhelmed with my unsatisfactory way of managing them all via email. So I bit the bullet and bought myself into the Professional Edition of Training Peaks. I've been contemplating this for a while but when I only had a handful of athletes I just couldn't justify it. But now I've got pretty close to what is a full load for me and my old way was NOT working for me anymore. I *knew* that transitioning into this program was going to cause me some extra work as I was really going to have to sit down and concentrate to learn all the bells and whistles of the program. I have to say though, the live support I got from the staff at Training Peaks was awesome and extremely helpful (thanks, Chris!). I'm proud to report that I managed to get all of my athletes up and running on TP in the last 3 days and all their schedules are written for next week. Phew.

So given that, here's what my days have looked like:

5:30 Wake up before my alarm with my brain spinning 100rpm with all the stuff I need to do but have not done yet. Get up and log onto my computer and start working. Spend several hours with a cup of coffee and work until I can't see the computer screen anymore. Get Moana up and ready for day care and thank Scott for taking her in. Keep working in my pajamas. Eventually I get to T1, which involves changing into run shorts and a sports bra and taking a break to go clear my head on the road. T2 involves a shower and one of my Coffees of Hawaii shirts (and some lip gloss, coffee flavored now, nonetheless) and then out the door to drum up some more business for COH. Smile! It's time to sell coffee! T3 @ 4:00 involves bringing a sippy cup full of milk to pick Moana up from daycare. Try to forget about all work (um, put that phone away!!) and play with my daughter at the park for an hour before dinner. T4 quick change into housewife mode as I prepare dinner and hope that Scott comes home before Moana rips the whole house apart. Eat. Clean kitchen. Thank Scott for taking care of Moana's bath/bedtime. T5 back to the computer to obsess about Training Peaks for several more hours until I can't see the computer anymore. T6 involves getting back into my pajamas and asleep by 10. Repeat in the morning...

This morning I did manage to get down to the beach as the sun was coming up for an ocean swim with Nalani. In truth, I don't think either of us were really looking forward to it. The wind was howling, the water was choppy, and it was not as warm as it should be for JULY in Hawaii. We're both tired and stressed out right now (for different reasons, neither of which are athletic related) and I think it would have been easy to dump the idea of a swim altogether in that angry ocean. But you know what? The ocean, even on those crazy choppy days, is a cure all. We finished up our workout with some barefoot running and skipping and sprinting in the sand and the smile that put on both of our faces was priceless. Ready to start the day!

I do think that next week will get a bit easier. First of all, I'll actually have 5 days to get my 5 days worth of work done. Seems like the last few weeks I've been trying to get 5 days worth of work done in 3 days. That's really hard.

Anyway, of course I am looking forward to the weekend and the Tour starting tomorrow, though I am foreshadowing some disharmony in our house given that the World Cup is not yet over... Scott and I may have to arm wrestle for that remote!