Weak.

So I haven't been super motivated to blog lately. I've had lots to say but most of what's taking up my brain space at the moment is related to my hamstring situation... and I don't know... I think I was hoping to wait to write a blog until I had it all figured out... but the way things are going it might be a while before I've got this thing fully resolved so I figured I'd try to sit down and organize an interim report of sorts. The purpose of this is mostly to organize my thoughts in my own head as I am trying to solve this problem but then I figured maybe somebody out there is going through something similar and this could help you avoid ending up in my scenario??

I think I've got my diagnosis dialed in as High Hamstring Tendonitis. If I were to say how/why I got this, since hindsight is 20/20, here's what I would say: Hamstrings were wicked tight after Cabo. I took a week and did next to nothing but then I thought I felt better so I started training again. I was pretty pissed/frustrated that my marathon was so shitty in Cabo, so coach and I got aggressive with the run training too early post-race. My hamstrings were telling me it was too much and I was making note of it in my PWN but I didn't stop the quality run sessions. I don't know if I just figured eventually they would just stop being pissed even though I was irritating them fairly often... whatever. They didn't stop getting pissed. They got more pissed. And one of them is still currently holding a grudge. Apparently hamstrings are like that.

So there was no one session that made this happen. It was a culmination of me being stubborn and pushing through with run sessions against my own better judgement. I *knew* in my gut that more hard running was going to hurt me but I did it anyway because it was on my schedule and heaven forbid I miss a workout once it's on my schedule. That was my mistake for sure. I should have known better. Maybe at some point I will heed this lesson that I have learned like 100 times already. <bangs head on wall>

Beyond this though I am finding out about the underlying factors that made me vulnerable to this in the first place. There are several, though maybe they are related??

I've always thought of myself as a strong athlete... like strength is my thing. But as it turns out, my strength has developed quite lopsided over the years. I've heard the term 'Quad Dominant Athlete' before but didn't totally understand what it meant, nor did I know that it applied to me!? Turns out, it does! And this is not a good thing for running. I'll go out on a limb and guess that maybe spending tons and tons of time mashing big gears on my bike pre-disposed me to developing this way, as well as having some faulty mechanics on the run... but the run mechanics thing is like the chicken and the egg, you know? Let me go back.

Last weekend I went to Jaco Rehab and had a run analysis done. It was super informative as the PT was awesome and she took me through a whole battery of physical 'tests' to see where my strengths and weaknesses are... where I am tight vs where I am not, etc. I'm going to guess I'm not totally unique here, but what she found was weak hamstrings, weak glutes, super tight hip flexors. Strong quads, strong abductors, weak adductors, weak core. Because of this hot mess my lower body as become, my run mechanics suck. I've learned a ton about biomechanics on the run recently and as it turns out, I'm doing pretty much all of it incorrectly. I think I have known this for a while but didn't really know exactly what was wrong or where to start in fixing it!? But it's not just about trying to focus on fixing it, because I am missing the basic ability to extend my hips since they are so tight... and since my hamstrings and glutes are so weak, they can't act to help extend that back leg anyway!

So given this info, no wonder I constantly get hurt when I try to run faster. I don't currently have the functional strength or mobility to support faster running.

So, #1 focus at this point is increasing my ability to extend my hips, and increasing strength in my core, hamstrings, and glutes. Basically, hold planks and single leg bridges like they are my job. I was told to be holding those single leg bridges for a minute at a time, 6x/day. Um ok. I'm up to being able to hold it for 20" now before I feel like my hamstrings are about to seize up in that debilitating cramp I am all to familiar with. Lovely. How the hell did my hamstrings become so completely non-functional?? I swear I remember having strong hamstrings but I guess that was years ago and I have since neglected functional strength exercises in favor of spending my time actually swimming, biking, and running. There are multiple views on this of course- some believing functional strength work is essential to triathlon performance and others believing you get all the functional strength work you need from swim/bike/run. You can guess which camp I used to be in and also which one I am in now. ;)

Next up, how to fix high hamstring tendonitis in a hurry? Honu is in 6 weeks and I have not been able to run at all for 2 weeks. Less than ideal for sure. Again, lots of conflicting advice when it comes to this as well! Ice. Don't ice! Heat. Leave it alone- don't touch it so it can heal on its own! No! Beat the crap out of it with ART, manual massage, graston, foam rollers, etc. Keep running easy- it won't heal unless it's stimulated. Don't run until it's all better. It's really important to stretch. Don't stretch or it will be more irritated... WTF??

So I'm kind of experimenting with all this to figure out what makes me personally feel better vs what does not. Running (even super easy jogging) does not make it feel better. Both heat and ice massage have made it temporarily feel better. Beating the crap out of it hurts a ton while it's being done but afterward does tend to make it feel better. Direct hamstring stretching does not make it feel better. Doing hip mobility drills/exercises and stretching other areas (hip flexors, adductors, quads) does tend to make it feel better. I found this website which has been one of the most informative sites I've ever come across and I am still exploring all these videos- but some of those mobility drills have been great. That said, I can get to the point where it feels pretty much 100% and I think  maybe I'm good to go but then I take one running step and pain comes right back. GAH. When that happened on Friday, after all this energy I've been putting into making this thing better, I just felt like completely throwing in the towel on this whole triathlon thing.

This morning I painted a smile on my face and went to cheer on some of my athletes and friends who were racing. It was a shitty morning for a triathlon, as you can plainly see. Racing this morning would have totally sucked. I didn't want to be out there at all. <ahem>

So, the moral of the story?
~Figure out where you're weak and fix it. You might need professional assistance here to figure it out.
~Listen to your body when it's talking to you.
~Don't get greedy with your training, especially when it comes to quality run sessions.

My gut says I'm not going to have this thing resolved in time for Honu, but I'm going to go do those damn single leg bridges again right now anyway. Maybe I'll manage 25" this time.

Swimming: The Only Subject I Can Talk About...

Can you guess which lane we swim in?? Lol. (Hint: It's not the chat lane!)

OK so still working out this hamstring/adductor issue. Leaving no stone unturned in my quest to fix it and feel like maybe I've earned a freakin' PHD in hip and posterior leg anatomy with all the learning I've done... Still no running or biking though so don't have a ton of results to report there. Will let you know once I have some concrete info on what actually fixed it.

In the meantime, I've been swimming a ton so that's all I really have as a subject to blog about. :( NOT that I hate swimming, but, you know, I'd prefer to have some good stories about running at this point.

Anyway.

~25K swimming in the last 6 days and swim fitness feels like it's running deeper than ever. I remember one time years ago (seriously, like 15 years ago!) when I was swimming really well and I remember thinking I hope I'm never swimming this fast again... with the point being that the only reason I was swimming so well was because I had no residual fatigue from bike or run. Alas, here I am again with no bike no run so not surprisingly, swim goes fairly well.

For the first time maybe ever, I swore out loud when I saw instructions for one of my swim sessions this week. 80x50's?!? WTF?? UGH. I swear had it said 40x100's I wouldn't have blinked an eye but 80x50's just sounded like hell to me. So.Boring. And not even really THAT challenging. Just boring! I fixed it though... since 80x50's sounds way more BSC than it actually is, I figured I'd make it actually BSC by doing it all with bands. 80x50's, 1 hard/1 easy, bands only qualifies as BSC in a way that plain old 80x50's does not. (SEE? I go freakin' insane when I can't run. It's bad. have to find other ways to torture myself! Ha!)

Since it was now a meaty enough set to take a real bite, I enjoyed that set in a way I would not have enjoyed it otherwise. And I felt a sense of fatigue getting out of the pool that I have not felt in some time, so that was satisfying. Save for the gross old guy swimming next to me in his underwear, TRUE STORY I shit you not, I'd call it a really good session.

Followed that up with a truly hard 5K session this morning. Interesting I hopped in the water and ripped off my fastest 1000 w/u ever (yes I time my 1000 warm-ups but don't race them per say- I just like to have an idea of my current easy-ish pace). I found it truly interesting that 4K bands only set yesterday forced me to really find my power in my catch/pull and it totally translated over to today. Super cool. So then we did 4K main set and I will say that when your swim fitness is deep, you can push SO MUCH HARDER than when your swim fitness is low. Every time we got to a part that was supposed to be 'fast' today, I was capable of pushing until I felt nauseous. And then HOLDING that pace. I'm not always capable of that. Sometimes (ok usually!) I fail muscularly before I can really dig like I could today. So that was cool.

Of interesting note- why are men incapable of hearing and understanding how to execute a long swim set?? And why are they incapable of understanding how to pace one when it's going to be both long and hard? Why do they feel the need to bolt on the first part that's supposed to be the easiest of the day?? Do they think that all of a sudden TODAY they are superman and will magically be able to hold their fastest 100 pace for 4000 meters? And when they get out half way through because they're too tired to continue do they think that next time they'll be able to keep up with the girls who managed to rip through the whole thing?? Hint: Maybe it's better to swallow your ego a bit and swim at a pace that enables you to actually finish the session.

So ya, Nalani and I swim together and usually there are 2 guys who join in... Interesting today they were both CRUSHING us for the first 5x100's (you know, the ones that were supposed to be just 'steady')... then we got to the fast parts and um, Hey what happened you guys?? Missed school the day they defined 'pace'? Lol. Sorry. I just had to vent b/c it's frustrating to feel like someone is racing you on the 'easy' parts then has nothing left to even attempt to change pace when it's supposed to be fast. <Rant over>

Hopefully one of these days I'll have a more interesting post about biking or running.... :)

On Taking Risks... and Being Broken

Lots of thoughts in my head right now... let's see if I can communicate them in any coherent way?

I've written before about searching for the edge... the cliff... where you're pushing in training because you're trying to improve and get faster... and at some point if you want to race to win you must do this. So we push until we sense that we're right near the edge of the cliff and then (if we're smart ad patient) we back off and rest/recover and then repeat... and then next time the edge is a little further out than it was before. All good stuff!

Sometimes though this means we end up flat on our backs under a tree mid run, or walking off the track in tears... Which means maybe we took a step (or three) too far and actually started falling off that cliff. It's easy to do, you know, when you're hungry and pushing and you just get greedy and go after a few more watts on the bike or a few seconds faster on that 800... This is what I have gone through this past week and now I'm paying the price.

Of course I sent an SOS email to coach that started off something like "So, um, how trashed should I be??" In all honesty the training I was trying to do was not outrageous but I guess 3 weeks post IM it was just too much as my body just wasn't ready to go as hard as I was trying to make it go. So when the plan calls for 1/2 IM effort on the bike and I rip 1/2IM watts out of my legs even though they don't want to do that today, well, I'm just digging a deeper hole for myself every day! Lesson: 1/2IM effort and 1/2IM watts are not always the same thing. Got.it.

My other issue is that apparently my body just does.not.like.running.fast. It is so freaking frustrating, you know?? I've got this great big base so now trying to get faster, which means I need to run faster... so I'm trying to run faster and my body is just rebelling in every way. Before Cabo is was my hip and my foot. My expectation was that I was going to be completely crippled post Cabo but to my pleasant surprise I was not... hip and foot are good... so ok... game on let's start working that run again and them BAM. Hamstring is pissed. If it's not one thing its another with me and this damn running. Clearly I am doing something mechanically incorrect when I try to pick up the pace on these runs so I am still trying to figure out what this is. Interesting to me that if I'm running easy/slow I can run 50+mpw no problems at all but if I'm trying to run faster, 30mpw and I'm injured.

So the plan going forward? I don't know. Coach yanked my power meter for the next 2 weeks on the bike b/c it makes me work too hard as I'm chasing the numbers I want to see. I need to listen to my body vs the gadget and only give what body wants to give that day... ok. And back off the speed work again on the run b/c clearly my body hates that stuff... but how frustrating is that? I want to make my run more competitive by running faster than 9' pace all the time but pushing and taking that risk is backfiring at the moment so I guess we just be more patient. BLAH. I hate being broken.

More On Ironman Recovery (or, Recover More!)

I like to think of myself as a fairly durable athlete... Over the years I've taught myself to be consistent in training and have managed to back up 20+ hour training weeks week after week (after week after week after week this year!) without much trouble. I think I thrive on volume and have surprised myself at how even when I think I'm tired I can still manage to rip off a decent training session if I try.

That said, Ironman kicks my ass.

Earlier in the week I actually felt pretty good and sent a note to coach saying that my head was in a good place and my swim times were right on best ever, which indicated to me that maybe the race didn't take as much out of me as an Ironman normally might. Which he interpreted to mean resume training as normal... which I thought I wanted to do... until tried to do it! 5 days later I'm raising the white flag! Yikes.Not.Recovered.Can't.Train.Normally.Yet. (Actually, what I wrote to one of my athletes describing how I felt it included a lot more F!*#^!!&% language I probably shouldn't use on a family blog... Hi Mom!)

I'm always amazed by athletes who can back up Ironmans, racing several in a row only a few weeks apart... or athletes who try to race a 70.3 two weeks post ironman. I've seen some who are able to pull that off brilliantly (Meredith Kessler comes to mind, though even she struggled at Melbourne last weekend) so it's clearly not impossible but I think most athletes really struggle with this, and for most, the reality of the fatigue comes back to bite you in the ass when you try to drill it again before you're really ready.

I was out riding this morning- just following my plan- which said to move it along in the back half if I felt good. Cliff notes version: I did not feel good. Not from the first pedal stroke and it never came around. My power meter just confirms what I feel but I was missing a good 20W off normal (30W off a strong day) and there was nothing in my head that thought it was a good idea to just try harder. Trying harder in this case = digging into a deeper hole. It did not help that the wind was stiff- and blowing into my face both ways?? Just when I was contemplating calling for a ride home (WHAT?? WHO AM I???) it started dumping rain... lovely. I interpreted that as the universe trying to tell me to stop being a dumbass. I did manage to pedal my way home under my own power but I bailed on the planned brick run without even blinking, and after a shower to wash off all the mud, I fell asleep on the couch.

More.Recovery.Time.Please.

On Recovering From Ironman...

Some post-IM recovery thoughts have been going through my head this week... thought they might be worth typing out! Obviously how you recover from an ironman depends on a bunch of variables... so since I'm writing from my own experience I'll say this is how it's gone for me given this was an early season Ironman for which my fitness level was high but I did not end up burying myself with super deep effort. Parts of this could be quite different for an end of season Ironman where you absolutely ripped yourself apart...

~ The evening after the race should involve alcohol of some sort. Usually we do Guiness floats (vanilla ice cream in our Guiness) but we could not find Guiness in Los Cabos so we went with tequila instead. Ironman athletes are not known for doing anything short of excessive so I'll just note here that 4 of us downed the entire bottle in significantly less time than it took to do the race. Team BSC rocks in more ways than one.

~After you're done drinking for the night, write a long email to your coach detailing the events of the day. If you do it when you're stumbling drunk, you're sure to write exactly what you were thinking without sugar coating it at all. Coaches love honesty.

~For the next 2-3 days, don't exercise at all. Eat a bunch of fried crap food that you would not normally otherwise touch. Spend time pretending you're not an athlete. Lay around and do nothing, go sightseeing if your race was in a cool place, and by all means, keep drinking.

~After you get home, it's normal to feel rather stressed as you try to get caught up on work/life that you missed while you were off torturing your body with excessive exercise then excessive alcohol. So, get up early, like 3AM, to make sure you have some quiet time to focus and get the most important aspects of your work out of the way.

~Day 5 post race all the fatigue might finally hit and you might be a crabby bitch with no energy for anything at all. Just go to bed. Your family has put up with you for all this time, they'll allow this too.

~By this time you're probably thinking you have no desire for any more tequila and just want kale. Go back to your high vegetable diet. You'll feel a ton better.

~Head out for a short/easy swim or bike ride. Don't start your watch. You really don't need to know. Really.

~If the weather looks like this, by all means, bail on that planned bike ride. You rode in enough rain when you were training, and today you're not "training". Go for a jog instead. Really.

~Jog super easy 5 miles and laugh at yourself at how slow it is (if you do indeed start your watch). Then make mental note that had you just jogged like this for the whole 26 miles last week you would have handed over a lot of cash to WTC for the opportunity to do it all again in October. Stop laughing.

~Spend your free time filling out race application forms for a bunch of little local races over the spring/summer. You're bored and the only way to cure that is to enter more races.

~Finally muster up the courage to use your Trigger Point roller and ball. Swear out loud a lot and hope your 4year old is not within earshot.

~Day 8. Back to business as usual. Show up at the pool and rip off a set of 10x200's faster than you've ever done them before. Where did that come from? #tequiladoesabodygood?

~Go for a bike ride and take note that you actually still genuinely like powergels. Wonder if that is more a testament to a great company making a great product, or simply proof that you're truly psychotic?

Ironman Los Cabos... AfterThoughts...

So Ironman #13 is in the books. Didn't turn out like I'd hoped... It wasn't all bad and I'm trying to see the positives while also figuring out how to move forward. Here's how the day went down from my perspective!

The swim at Palmilla Beach is awesome. Super nice ocean venue, water was pretty calm/glassy as expected though we encountered a little chop on the home stretch. It was indeed a running beach start and those are just complete batshitcrazy chaos and I was nervous about it. Watch this video and you'll see why I never found Nalani's feet like I was hoping!! Turned out fine though... I had physical combat only for maybe a minute where it was ugly and then I was totally alone (swimming way wide on the right side) all the way to the first turn buoy where I melded into a decent sized group. Didn't see any other orange caps- all green as far as I could see which meant I was surrounded by men. At times I felt frustrated that I couldn't get around these guys- drafting felt too easy an effort but I tried like 3x to move off to the side and bridge up to another group... but each time I did that all I ended up doing was working harder but wasn't actually going faster. Eventually I conceded and just eased up, cruising mid-pack with this group. I came out of the water and saw 57' which was fine- I thought I was fit enough to swim faster but whatever...

It was a long uphill run in the sand and on steps to get to the T1 tent...

I saw only Nalani and Julie in the tent (hi friends!!) and figured I was 3rd out and felt content with that. Looking at the swim splits I'll go out on a limb and say the swim was a little long or slow for everyone.

The bike was quite a bit more challenging than any of us knew. To be honest, I freakin' LOVED it. I passed Julie ~15 minutes into the race and just like that I was leading the age group women at Ironman Los Cabos!

Nearly the entire 112 miles was either up or down. I used my full spectrum of gears 39/23 all the way to 53/11. For the most part I felt great! Followed my plan of taking in ~1800 cal (4 bottles of Infinit and 6 powergels- simple!), took water at most aid stations and drank some of it and poured some of it over myself... took e21 and vespa as planned... and rode alone most of the day. Every once in a while a man would pass but I will say what I LOVED most about this course is that it was pretty much impossible for draft packs to form. Hands down this was the most honest ironman bike course I've ever seen and it was SO REFRESHING to not get passed by a woman sitting on the back of a pack of 10 men sucking wheel. Several times through the bike I just had flashing thoughts like I FREAKIN' LOVE IRONMAN LOS CABOS!!!

I knew I was riding well. I'd started my watch and I knew the course wasn't going to be fast so I didn't stress about how long it was all taking. If it was taking me a long time it was taking everyone else a long time too and I was comfortable with that. I'd definitely say I enjoyed the airport section more than the corridor section, but primarily b/c I was trained to just hold steady Ironman power and the corridor section was way more over/under type efforts on the steeper hills. Even though the climb to the airport was long and slow, it was steady so it suited me better. And the headwind on the way back also suited me. I actually enjoyed the last section of headwind possibly the most of the whole race! I felt like I just got stronger as I went, I knew I'd had a solid ride even if my split looked slow for a normal 112 miles, and my energy/mental state was good so heading into T2 I thought *maybe* I'd actually be able to run?? I had hope anyway. :)

If I'm honest I'd say that deep down I knew I was not fully physically prepared for this marathon. I didn't elaborate on the state of my injury going into this race b/c I don't ever want to put out an excuse before the race even starts... like here's my excuse of why I'm not going to do well... I hate that! In good news both my hip and my foot were fine by the start of race week but for the 6 weeks prior I'd been managing them to the point where I had to cut back quite a bit on running overall (I replaced that training time with swim/bike and it showed!)... I was hoping maybe my overall fitness and a strong/positive mental state (and some sparkle magic!!) would carry me through the marathon but it did not. I got through ~9 miles avg ~9' pace which was my goal. Def didn't feel super but still had hopes I could will myself to keep it up.

Somewhere around mile 12 I had a complete seizure of my sartorius muscle (same damn one every time) and that was pretty much the end of it for me. I was stopped in my tracks for several minutes unable to even walk or make any forward progress... finally I started up again but knew that if I tried to really 'run' that it would seize up again... so I resorted to this horribly embarrassing walk/jog routine and it was all those damn leg muscles would allow me to do. I'd say mentally I kept 'fighting' til maybe mile 18 or so then I just gave in and pretty much stopped trying. (Not proud of this but it is what it is! Just being honest...) By then I'd been passed so much and felt like there was nothing left to try to salvage so my effort level went down. That said, I tried to run toward the end but had another complete seizure of the same sartorius at mile 25.9... so close to the finish line and this guy was screaming at me the finish is right there keep going!!! I just stared at him and growled YOU ARE NOT HELPING. When that thing seizes up I can't even stand up straight until it releases and I needed to just try to relax and bring the adrenaline down. So I walked across the finish line and for the first time ever didn't smile or put my hands up in the air. It did not feel like a victory at all.

So there you go. Many (probably everyone except my coach and me) might say I biked too hard... My take is that I just didn't have the specific muscular endurance I needed to run a decent marathon. I think I could have biked 10' slower and I still would not have had a great marathon on Sunday. My stomach was fine the whole time... I took in gels and coke and gatorade and water and e21 and vespa totally to plan so it was not an energy issue- it was 100% muscular. Unfortunately I am not a natural runner- though I do believe that I can run a ton better but in order to that I have to run often and a lot. When I'm running often and a lot, my run gets better! When my run training is limited, it goes to shit! #rocketscience

Of course I was disappointed at the finish, though some of that feeling was muted when I found out that Patrick killed it all day, finishing in 10 hours flat with an Ironman marathon PR and placing 3rd in his age group with a spot to Kona! Super proud of him and happy about his hard work paying off! Armando pulled off a great performance relative to the training he was able to put in this cycle (10:40)... so he was very pleased. Nalani had the fastest amateur female swim split on the day (again!) and gritted her teeth through the marathon for 6th in her age group after the hills on the bike course nearly did her in... And Lou had a swim PR and a solid bike... still figuring out nutrition on that marathon but after he puked for a few miles he finished strong and motivated- top 25% of his age group. :)

Nearly a week later I'd say my head is in a pretty good spot. Coach has been supportive and said he has a plan for me going forward (he now understands the gravity of the situation when it comes to me and running!!) so I'll be spending a lot of quality time with my trigger point set trying to make sure I avoid the injury issues that plagued me this training cycle so I can train consistently in the coming months. I'm not giving up. One of these times I am going to figure out that damn Ironman marathon that has eluded me thus far! GAH!

'Twas The Night Before Ironman...

Ok so it's almost time to play! Saturday afternoon just hanging in the room relaxing... Bike is checked, bags are packed, etc. interestingly the wind is ripping right now and there are white caps on the ocean... Too bad it won't likely be like this tomorrow morning! ;)

The pattern of the days here has gone something like this: cool mornings with no wind at all. Ocean is totally glassy and ~70 degrees. I anticipate no adversity in the swim tomorrow. Then wind starts picking up around mid-morning, so I'd guess we'll be encountering that 2nd loop of the bike.Wind  makes the run a lot cooler than it otherwise would be so the run shouldn't be blistering hot like it could be if it was calm. Really temps are not that hot but the sun is very strong and you feel it penetrating your skin. Light clouds help a lot! Overall the course is hillier than I anticipated. Even the run has some good little rollers. Nothing too daunting but relentless up/down with only a few flat areas. Overall I'd say my guess is that it is going to be a fair course that favors a strong athlete! I'm going to predict it will not be a smokin' fast course? But not ridiculously slow or excessively challenging either... I think it falls right in the middle as far as ironman courses go.

We've had fun so far... Yesterday morning Nalani and I swam with Hillary and Maik... That was fun (and confidence building!) and the seals we saw playing (so close to us!) were the icing on the cake! There is a lot of life in this ocean... We see whales breaching all over! I actually wanted to swim out by our hotel this morning bc I thought a whale encounter would make a cool story. Nalani disagreed so we went back to the swim course this morning and swam there- this time with Julie Dunkle. It was mellow and fun except for the fact that we all got stung! Not sure by what? There were these cool little neon blue sparkle things in the water below us (Magic blue sparkle! Watch out it might sting you!) so might have been that? I don't know. It wasn't that bad though. I think experience being in the ocean and getting stung and realizing you live through it might be a good thing here. My goal for the swim is to stay on Nalani's feet for as long as I can and see what happens. Rumor has it it's a running beach start so honestly I may never find her feet if its that kind of start (read: running beach starts are MASS CHAOS).

Looking forward to biking tomorrow. I've ridden a little bit the last few days but honestly it hasn't been great- the traffic is scarier than anything I've ridden in before and I've found myself feeling super timid which is odd for me. The course/road itself actually looks like it has the potential to be nice but the traffic doesnt let us experience that. Roads are closed on the course tomorrow so hopefully I'll put my big girl pants on and be brave! That's my goal for the bike. Be brave!

Not really sure what to expect on the run? 3x out/back but it appears there are 4x turn-arounds on each loop so that's a lot of 180degree turns!! I accidentally ran part of it today... Found T2 which is different from T1 which is different from the finish line. I'm guessing I'll be a little lost the first time around in the run but after that I'll have it figured out. :) As always in my world, the run is a bit of a crap shoot but my goal is to keep putting one foot in front of the other in an action that can technically be called "running" (vs walking!) and not over think anything. Just shut my brain off and run. That's all. (Sounds so easy, no??)

Anyway, that's it! Sorry no pictures... I'm posting from my iPad and too lazy to figure out how to post pics. But look on FB or Twitter bc lots of pics are being posted there by everyone and well, that's pretty much what it looks like here! Beautiful! This really does have the potential to be a top shelf race. I hope they pull it off in a way that does it justice!