Road Trip

This week-end my Mom, Susan, Angela and I are going on a road trip to Penticton.  We'll be up with the birds on Friday to leave by 6am.  Mom, Susan and I will take turns driving and we get to take the nice vehicle - my parents' Pacifica - that drives like it's on rails.  We'll be camping, except my Mom will sleep in the vehicle.  It's going to be a whirlwind trip - returning on Monday - and I'm excited about it.

I am going to be volunteering at Ironman Canada taking care of the special needs bags.  Those are bags where the athletes put any ... well ... special needs that they may need for the bike or the run.  One year, I put a package of sesame seed snaps in my run special needs bag as a treat at the half way point of the marathon.  Mind you I couldn't stomach them by the time I opened them up and I could barely eat one.  Athletes put anything from cookies to PBJ sandwiches or an extra T-shirt or socks in their bags; some put extra tire tubes in their bike special needs bag.  The bags aren't returned, so nothing of value is put in the bags.  On race morning before the race starts, the athletes drop off their bags in specially marked boxes (sounds like a cereal commercial), more the size of bins, and the run bags are then trucked out to the half way point of the marathon and the bike bags are taken to their designated spot.  When the athlete approaches the bike or run special needs area, a volunteer yells out the athlete's bib number to another volunteer who collects the bag to give to the athlete.  It's a very smooth operation.  My shift is from 4:30 am - 7:00 am, so I'll be up at 3:30 am.  Crazy you say!  Maybe... but instead of waiting in long line-ups to register for next year's race, I will get to go to the front of the line because I volunteered.

Fruit is another purpose for our trip.  Since we're going down there anyway, Mom plans on bringing back a lot of fruit.  Last time we were there, we could barely see out the back window because there was so much fruit.

Last forecast I heard was mid 30s for the entire week-end and my new hat will come in handy to keep me cool, or as cool as a person can get in 30 degree weather.  I'm going to have to get a couple of runs in to prepare for the Aussie heat.  If you are interested in reading about Ironman Canada, check it out here.

Viva Las Vegas

This is officially my year for travel.  My friends, Susan (AKA racer girl), Angela and I are going to Las Vegas in December to run in the Rock 'n' Roll Las Vegas Half Marathon.   I'll be back from Australia for a month and then I'm off to a warmer climate again.  It seems all of my holidays involve a race of some sort.

The race is on December 6 and there will be entertainment along the entire race course and hopefully it will make 13.1 miles of running go by quickly.  Hell, maybe it'll make me run faster too.  I estimate the race will take me 1:56:30 to complete.  After the race that evening Susan and I are rewarding ourselves by going to Cher ... yes, boys and girls ... Cher, from Sonny and Cher.  Yeah, I can hear you saying it... Cher? What is she going to perform from a convalescent home? The truth is at 61 she looks far better than plenty of women half her age and the chances are she will outperform plenty of entertainers and I think it will be a fabulous show.  Apparently, between her 16 dancers and herself, there are 140 costume changes throughout the 90 minute show at the Colloseum in Caesar's Palace.

Don't get me wrong, we aren't only going to see Cher and race in the half marathon.  There will also be lots of money to be spent at various shops throughout the thriving metropolis known as Sin City.  This is definately turning out to be the most expensive year of my life.  My next step is to find a reasonable priced hotel/flight package.  We did things in kind of a backwards order - first we bought Cher tickets, then we registered for the race and now we have to keep our eye out for a package to get us down there.

I won't be back long before I start training for Ironman next summer.

Bridge Climb

To think that more than a year ago I committed to going to Australia to participate in the World Masters Games and now I leave in 45 days. The only thing left for me to do now is get my Visa so I can enter Australia - different than my passport. My travel agent will arrange that for me. I've already spent more money than I have saved for the trip and I'm sure I'll be running around frantically during the last week and spending more. My training now involves running in the heat of the day to acclimatize for Australia's climate. I'm also still riding my bike, but not as often as when I was training for triathlon.

Last night my Sydney room mate, Janis, and I purchased tickets for the Bridge Climb in Sydney. We decided to go on the late twilight climb. We will start the climb during daylight and get to the summit of the bridge during twilight and into the night. Seeing Sydney's lights from that vantage point will be spectacular. It was more expensive than the day climbs, but apparently well worth the extra money. Oh, what the hell - it's a once in a lifetime experience. Check it out. Click on the picture then move your mouse around. I'm really looking forward to it. It cost $258 AUD, so it'll be around $233 Cdn using today's exchange rate. Dad thinks I'm crazy, but he's not as adventurous as I am.

Now that my departure date is fast approaching, I will post blogs more often, so watch for them.

Australia, Here I Come!

49 days to go, but who's counting - I'm ticking off the days on my calendar at work. I'm already starting to pack - well, not really. Whenever I think of something to take with me, I throw it in my suitcase in the basement so I won't forget it when the time comes. The biggest concern I have now is what do I do with my extra luggage? I am allowed to take two pieces of checked baggage and two carry-ons, but only allowed to take one piece of luggage (with a maximum of 50 pounds) on my bus tour after the Games. I can store the extra piece in a secure area at the Sydney Airport for approximately $200 Australian, or I can ask my room mate (from Calgary) to take it home with her and send it to me via Greyhound delivery - may be a little less money, but I'd have to pay her for the extra piece on the airplane and pay for sending it to Edmonton. I like the idea of storing it at the airport because I know it'll be waiting for me when I get back there, where as if I give it to my Sydney room mate I may worry about it getting back to me. Saving the little bit of money isn't really a concern when I have already spent more than $5,000 on the trip, and I haven't even arrived yet! I think I have already answered my own question, but what's your opinion? Let me know and I'll respond with a comment.

Intact 10 km Race

Race morning - get up and shower, just to warm up my muscles a bit to stretch. I don't know if it works, but it makes me think it helps because my last two races have went well when I showered in the morning. Next, traditional race morning breakfast of oatmeal. Next, check the weather while eating breakfast. Finally, get dressed.

I left the house at 8:15 am to pick up Racer Girl (Susan) at 8:30. 9:30 am - race start and off we went. The run started at Sir Winston Churchill Square and along 102 Avenue down to Stony Plain Road and back. At the 2 km mark I looked at my watch and it was 11 minutes. I said to myself "self, you better start running faster or it's gonna take you 55 minutes to run this race." I picked up the pace and at the 5 km mark I pressed the lap button on my watch - it said 26:43. OK, if I manage to run the last half at the same pace, it's going to be a 52 and a half minute race. That's average for me. I kept up the same pace for the second half, or at least I thought I did, but when I finished I was pleasantly surprised that my second half was 26:09 - 34 seconds faster - WOW! This is my sixth race this season and I'm pleased to say 'the races have improved my performance.' I came in sixth in my age group and Susan came in sixth too (sixes all around, anybody?). At the time the results were posted there were 28 people in my age group and 12 is Susan's, but don't know how many more came in after that.) Here are the results. I don't know what's up with the results saying I came in 7th when yesterday the results said I was 6th, but I guess I'll settle for being 7th out of 64 women in my age group. I'm also pretty pleased that I came 55th overall out of 345 women.

I was hanging out and eventually made my way back to the finish line to watch Susan cross it, only to see that she had already finished. She was only three and a half minutes behind me. She totally under estimated her ability to run that distance. After the race, we stretched and checked out the expo, but were particularly interested in the compression socks - I'm going to purchase a pair. They will be great to wear on the airplane to Australia because I'll be sitting for so long. I might even wear them for the 1/2 marathon - I've seen a lot of runners wear them in long distance races.

We went to the YMCA for a soak in the hot tub and then shopped at Holt Renfrew. Of course I didn't buy anything. I kept telling myself that Australia is more important. We went to Zenari's for lunch, and that put me back $12.

It was a totally relaxing day. Susan called it a "spa day" and the best part - it only cost us $2 to park underground because I have a membership at the YMCA that entitles me to three hours free parking, but we extended our parking to about seven hours.

All in all, a great day. When I woke up this morning, I found out Paul Tichelaar was in the race (it was in the paper). Paul is a friend of mine who was in the 2008 Olympics competing in triathlon. I told my Dad "I bet I'll pass Paul". He said "I bet you won't." Well I did pass him, but unfortunately it was when I was on my way out and he was way past the half way point on his way back. I passed him going the other way.

It's A Woman's Prerogative To Change Her Mind, Isn't It?

This is going to be a short post. My last post mentioned that I may do another triathlon at the end of August. Well, the triathlon I was referring to is the Leduc Women's Only Tri, but it is on the September long week-end and if that week-end is anything like last year's September long week-end where I froze on the bike, I don't want to go through that again, so instead I am running a 10km race this coming week-end with a friend. My tri season is over now and I'm now starting to prepare for my running races in Australia starting in 58 days. My trip starts in 52 days, but my first run isn't until six days in to the holiday.

Devon Triathlon

I did the Devon sprint tri today. My goal was to go hard for the whole race and win gold. My cousins and Aunt came to watch me. I also read an article that said to make your race fast, drink coffee (no sugar or cream, just black) on race morning, so I decided to try it. An urn of Tim Hortons coffee was on hand. It was disgusting, but I toughed it out. I thought "if this makes me win, it'll be worth it."

The morning started out a little chilly and I had to go to the bathroom about four times before I even started the race. Nerves, or coffee? Probably both. The wind was picking up and the sun was hiding behind the clouds. We were all shivering on deck while waiting for our race to start. I was waiting for the clouds to burn off so we could have a beautiful sunny summer day. I wanted to do flip turns for the entire swim, but that didn't work out too well because one end was so shallow and I didn't want to hit my head on the bottom of the pool and the wall on the other end wasn't marked very well, so I decided that open turns are probably the way to go. My swim went well and I kept up my pace for the whole swim. It was an outdoor pool and I was swimming through leaves and the water was very warm; it even smelled. I've come to the conclusion indoor pools are far superior. When I registered for this race, I said my swim time would be 17 minutes (that's how they determine what heat I would swim in). Fifteen laps in 16:50 - pretty accurate! Damn, I forgot to start my watch. I'd have to wait for the results before I would know how I did.

I got to T1 (bike to swim transition) and I was losing my balance. It's not easy going from a horizontal position to an upright position standing on one foot at a time trying to get bike shoes on. I finally got my shoes on and ran to the "mount" line. It felt good when the announcer called my name and number while I was running with my bike (pretty quickly I might add) and said "That girl is in shape". I'd never ran that well with my bike before. That was all fine and dandy until I mounted my bike and wasted a lot of time trying to clip into my pedals - for some reason the clip-in-to-my-pedals Gods weren't working with me. The 20 km ride was an out and back on highway 60. I made sure I thanked all the volunteers along the way because it's getting difficult for race directors to find volunteers anymore, so I like letting the volunteers know they are very much appreciated. 40:50 for 20 km - not too shabby. That must be one of the faster bikes I've had for that distance.

T2 was OK. I always have difficulty keeping my balance after a ride while trying to put on my running shoes, especially since I was riding hard today. I'd like to see myself in transitions - it must be hilarious! My run started out fast and I slowed down (just a bit) once I got out of sight of all the spectators (ha). My run was still pretty quick and I maintained that pace throughout. I pulled in several women, and even a man and passed them. I dug deep because that elusive gold was waiting for me. My run was 26:32 - a respectable time. Next year I'm doing Ironman again so I'm going to have to train - something I haven't been doing regularly this year.

It always feels good to cross the finish line and hear my name being called. Somehow I feel famous, or at least important. I was so happy because I came first in my age group of 45-49 with a time of 1:24:12. My goal of gold was met. Was it the coffee? Hmmmm! My bubble was quickly burst when they were giving the awards to the top three in each age group. They changed the age group to 40-49. I was now also competing against women that could be anywhere from three to seven years younger than me and there were more women to compete against - 8 more. I was now second in my age group - 2nd out of 12 instead of first out of four. I let the organizers know how I felt about that. On top of that, they weren't giving away medals, they were giving away prizes. I guess the up side could be that I know I'm faster than seven women who I definitely know are younger than me! You can check out my results here.

I thought that this was going to be my last tri of the season, but I did so well, I think I'll do another one at the end of August and go for gold at that one too. Stay tuned.