July 3, 2009

A Must Watch

I'm sure you've all heard of the Wassner twins, both professional triathletes and both very, very fast! You may also know about their involvement with TEAM FIGHT and the Ulman Cancer Fund for Young Adults. Laurel is a cancer survivor and I think her story is pretty awesome and inspiring.

Last year I think I raced at about 4 or 5 of the same races that the Wassners did - St. Anthony's, Columbia, Philly, NYC... And again this year I've seen them a few times. They race with such intensity but Laurel still always has a smile on her face! Anyway, I'm a big fan.

At Philly this year when Bec was given the mic for her victory speech, she mentioned the new Nike/LiveStrong ad campaign that was going to debut that night. So of course I had to go to the Nike website to check things out. I saw the Lance Armstrong ad on tv for the first time tonight. I swear those commercials always almost make me tear up.

But what you REALLY have to check out is this video. While you are on the site check out all the videos. I LOVE them. And I would be way too embarrassed to tell you how many times I've watched the video about the Wassners and Lance Mackey. :) (by the way, the video footage from the Wassner video is from Columbia!)

Cancer is such a devastating disease. And we are all touched by it in some way. Or we will be. I'm so inspired by the strength that cancer victims display day in and day out for a battle that I'm sure they didn't want to fight. Pretty darn amazing if you ask me.

Happy 4th everyone!

Posted by beth at 7:00 PM | Comments (0)

July 1, 2009

Happy July!

And if you are Canadien, Happy Canada Day! (what is Canada Day anyway? kind of like our July 4th?)

Anyway, my foot is on the mend. I know you were all wondering. Actually, you could probably all care less. :) But, I have to admit that I was getting worried. Foot (which I smashed on a rock coming out of the water in Philly in case you didn't read the race report) definitely hurt on Sunday but come Monday I thought I was going to have to saw it off. On Monday it REALLY hurt. Like can't put any weight on it type of hurt.

So what did I do? I took lots of Ibuprofen, iced it like crazy and sat at my computer for 10 hours catching up on work. And tried to convince myself that it really wasn't broken. And hoped like heck it would feel better on Tuesday.

Tuesday rolled around and it still hurt really badly. I did get on my trainer to ride my bike and was very, very relieved to not feel any pain pushing the pedals. Or only very, very slight pain. Well, I might not be able to walk, run or swim again but at least I can ride my bike!

Also on Tuesday, I was scheduled to work at the hospital. This was a little worrisome because that involves a lot of walking. My foot definitely felt better with my running shoes on but still, ouch. I got through the day though. Still, on my drive home I was convinced that I really did break my foot. I mean really, can a bruise hurt this badly?

Luckily Julia (PT extraordinnaire) came to my rescue. She commented on FB about how inflammation (which I had a LOT of - couldn't even move my toes there was so much swollen-ness/inflammation in the area) peaked at ~72 hours and then things would calm down from there. Hmm...now THAT'S a little tidbit that I could work with! I emailed Julia with all kind of questions and she calmed my fears. She should of just said, "no pycho, your foot isn't broken, now JUST CALM DOWN!" but she was much nicer than that. :)

THANKFULLY, when I woke up this morning (indeed ~72 hours after the initial trauma), my foot felt somewhat better. Yes, still very sore to walk on but now I didn't wince with every step and I could move my toes around! And with shoes on, walking was definitely much more bearable! (barefoot walking is still out of the question)

So I went to the YMCA for a morning of fun. First up was my swim workout which I was kind of worried about because pushing off the wall seemed like it was going to be painful. But I told myself I could still do the swim and just not use the walls if worse came to worse. Luckily, pushing off the wall was only slightly painful so I was able to swim normally! Then I did my running workout in the deep end of the pool. Then I got out of the pool and had very wrinkly fingers from being in the water for wayyyy too long. :)

I also lifted while I was at the YMCA and noticed that I wasn't even limping anymore! Yes, things with the foot are definitely improving. Thank goodness! Don't think I will be running any time soon but I'm just happy to see some progress. My coach told me the rest would do me good. Bottom line though, and moral of the story is, avoid the rocks at the swim exit my friends!

In other news, I felt really good swimming this morning which was extremely nice because the last time I felt good swimming seemed like about 5 months ago. Ok, that's a huge exaggeration. But it did make me very happy. Also, our dog is a bread thief. If you've been reading this blog long enough you might remember the time Roxy stole and ate an entire fruit cake around Christmas time about 3-4 years ago. Then, she figured out how to open our bread drawer and ate about 2-3 loaves of bread before we finally wised up and moved our bread to higher ground. Well over the weekend when we were in Philly Roxy spent her days at Oscar's parent's house. Being the rude little house guest that she is, she decided to help herself to about 1/2 of a loaf of freshly baked bread that was cooling on the counter. Of course the other half of the loaf was rendered useless with dog slobber all over it. I have no doubt she would have devoured the whole thing had she not been caught in act. BAD DOG! (but really cute and, in the end, that is how she saves herself every time)

Okay, back to work! Hope everyone is having a wonderful start to July!

Posted by beth at 2:36 PM | Comments (7)

June 29, 2009

Philadelphia Triathlon

Where to begin? Perhaps we'll start on Thursday night, the day before we were to leave, when I decided to break everything I own. Okay, I guess not EVERYthing. But I did start by breaking my front race wheel (it would not hold any air despite every effort on the part of O and I) and then my computer. Not my bike computer, but my regular computer. The regular computer that contains all my client information and several computer programs that are very specialized for my business. Yes that computer. It wouldn't even turn on. At all.

Of course I did all of this at about 10 pm at night.

Needless to say, I didn't get too much sleep that night but come Friday morning O and I formulated a plan to get everything in working order and still get to Philadephia (about a 5 hour drive) on time. It was a little stressful but lucky for me, I have the best husband on earth. He took care of the computer (some sort of battery hiccup but it's working just fine now!) and then the wheel (THANK you to Big Bang Bikes for taking care of us always) while I took care of packing things up and taking Roxy to Greensburg where O's parents were watching her for the weekend.

WHEW!

After that mayhem the trip went much more smoothly and we got to Philly in a timely fashion. We stayed in a much nicer (and somehow cheaper and more convienent) hotel this year and had the benefit of knowing where things were from doing the race last year. I do like doing new events but it's very nice to do the same ones too so you know what's going on!

Race morning!

I was really excited to race. I knew Bri and my teammate Lindsay were racing in addition to Alice, who I barely just beat out at Columbia in May. Those 3 would certainly make it a very exciting and competitive race not to mention many others! Unfortunately Philly doesn't have an "elite amateur" wave so we couldn't all race head to head but Lindsay and Bri are both old like me so we at least all started together. :)

I got over to the swim start (you have to ride a bus to get there) with O early and got in for a practice swim. But then I had a longggg wait until I started as I was in one of the last waves to go. Luckily Bri and Marty found us and we had someone to talk to! I was especially happy to have Bri there at the start once O left to go back over to transition. I am always so nervous before the start of a race, it's just nice to have someone to talk to and take your mind off of what's to come!

The big talk of the morning was that the current was stronger than usual in the river. So I'm picturing NYC where the current is so strong you have to hold onto something or else you get pulled downstream! Well it was nothing like NYC but there definitely was a current and it definitely helped!

My plan for the swim was to try to stay on Bri's feet for as long as possible. Hmmm...not so sure if that was a good plan because she pretty much just swam right away from me. :) But still, I found other feet to swim on and as I got out of the water I glanced at my watch and saw 19:xx. I nearly had a heart attack! 19? I've never broken 22 minutes before! :) Okay, maybe that current was a little stronger than I thought. :) But still, I'm calling it a good swim because in relation to everyone else's time, I was much closer to the fast fishies than usual. Trust me, I'm usually the one getting out of the water 4 minutes behind!

Unfortunately as I exited the water I managed to find the one big rock in the grass that was sticking out and cracked my right foot on it pretty hard. Pain shot up through my foot and I stumbled a little but at the time didn't think much of it because I WAS RACING! (more to come on this however)

Onto the bike and happy as ever. I think I will always be one of those triathletes that is just SO happy to get on their bike and be out of the water. :)

I had forgotten how squirrelly this bike course is. The Olympic distance race has something like 2500-3000 people entered in it and the bike course is 2 loops. EGADS! There were just people all over the place. I think it was better last year because my wave went off much earlier and at least for the 1st loop I had a clear path. Not so this year. You could probably stay aero for about 98% of this course if you had people racing properly and things weren't so crowded but yesterday I was probably aero about 50% of the time! Regardless, I knew it was the same for everyone in my age group so if I was slowed down because of course congestion, so were they.

It wasn't very long into the bike that I saw Lindsay! This is how I knew I swam better than usual as it usually takes me 15-20 miles to catch glimpse of her on the bike! Around the same time I found Linsday I also passed another gal in our AG that looked to be riding strong. And so for the next 15 miles of the bike the 3 of us went back and forth and back and forth. I'd get ahead on the uphills, they would pass me back on the downhills. It was good because it kept me focused. And I also knew Bri was still out there ahead of us too.

With about 5 miles to go we found Bri. Now there were 4 of us. I had wanted to try to get as much distance as I could on Bri on the bike because I knew she would run very fast...

...but that didn't really happen. :) I believe Linsday, Bri, the unidentified person and I all came into T2 very close together although I wasn't spending time looking around - I was just trying to get out of there ASAP!

As I started to run my foot hurt. OUCH! Why does my foot hurt? Oh right, I cracked it on a rock! But that was neither here nor there because I had more important things on my mind. Like getting away from the 3 very fast runners behind me!

I was leading for about 2 miles when the unidentified person (and eventual winner) caught me. We ran together for a bit but then I just couldn't keep her pace. Sigh. Darn running - it used to be my strength! Of course I could make all sorts of excuses but the fact of the matter is, my running is turning into my liability instead! I just need to stay focused on staying healthy and I know I can turn that around. And also know that my perspective has to change some. As my coach told me, it was easier to feel like a great runner when I wasn't as good of a swimmer/cyclist before as I would come off the bike back in xth place and it was FUN to catch 7 or 8 people on the run! But as my swimming and cycling improves I'm finding myself coming off the bike in much higher positions where instead of being the passer I'm the passee! As I found out yesterday, it's much different to be the hunted coming out of T2 first! Good point coach!

Anyway, Bri was the next one to pass me. Darn it again! Stop the bleeding! Bri was smart and didn't even give me an option of running with her - she just kept trucking right on by. I knew Lindsay was looming back there too so I focused as hard as I could on Bri's back and not letting her get away.

She gapped me by about 100 yds. But then she didn't get farther ahead. Of course I was really hurting and wanting this race to end NOW. One thing's for sure, racing isn't easy.

So I kept running and although my mile splits were more like 6:30-6:40 instead of the 6:20s that I wanted, I just kept pushing. Around mile 5 I thought "hmm...is Bri getting closer...even by just a little?" That thought kept me entertained for the next few minutes until I decided that she was indeed coming back to me a little but likely still too far away to catch. Yet still I had in the back of my head that "anything is possible and because of that not to give up." As I think I've said before I'm ever the optimist while racing. :)

At mile 6 I decided I should go for it. I knew I had about 75 seconds left of running so I had to plan this right. If I passed Bri too early she would certainly respond and just pass me right back. So go when there isn't much time left and go as hard as you can! Which is what I did. I don't think I've ever sprinted so hard at the end of a race!

Afterwards I felt kind of bad about it. I know racing is racing but it felt a bit like a cheap pass right at the end of a race. I totally had the advantage in being behind Bri the whole time but of course she was a very good sport about it! And at the time, in the race, you can only think of one thing - passing all the people that you can!

Regardless, our AG ended up being the fastest of the bunch which left the unidentified person (later to be identified as Rebecca from MD!), myself, Bri and then Linsday as going 1-2-3-4 in the overall amateur female race. Yeah for 30-34 year old ladies! :)

So I was happy. I was 2nd overall with a 2:10:54 and I was praying that the first place person was from another state as Philly was the Best of the US qualifier for PA.

Luckily she was. Rebecca is from Maryland! Yeah! One of my major goals for this year was to qualify for BOUS again and so I was very pleased to do so.

All in all a great day. Although back to that foot, after the race it REALLY started to hurt. As in limping, can't put weight on it, how in the heck did I just run a very hard 10K on it type of pain. It was also turning black and blue and getting swollen. ARGHHHHHH! My hamstring issues are enough to deal with!

I iced it (stole ice from the Chipotle :) and took Ibuprofen on the way home but when we did finally manage to get back to Pittsburgh I went to the local ER to get xrays JUST to make sure I didn't break anything. What can I say, my mom convinced me. :) Nothing was broken (although the doctor told me there could be a hairline fracture that an xray wouldn't pick up) but that it was likely just a bad contusion. Whoo-ee, bad contusion is right! This morning it feels like I'm walking on a giant goose egg! It's still quite painful and I'm limping but I'm continuing with my ice/Ibuprofen regimen and just keeping off it as much as I can. Hopefully I won't miss too much training time because of it but either way, I asked my hamstring very nicely if it wouldn't mind getting better too while I'm resting my foot. :)

Bri, Rebecca and I getting our awards. They are shaped like that big cracked bell that Philly is so proud of. :)

My teammate Linsday and I. I would be remiss if I didn't brag about Linsday at least a little! She just crushed her PR at Eagleman, winning her AG, getting another Kona slot and getting 2nd OA amateur! And she has a lot more racing to do this year at IMLP, Kona and I'm trying to talk her into AG Nationals. :) Plus, she's really humble and nice and a great teammate to have. All my MAO teammates are great. And fast. We must have good coaches or something. :)

So congrats to everyone who raced this weekend! And thanks to everyone's good luck wishes and support. This sport is amazing simply for all the wonderful people it's made up of!

Posted by beth at 12:55 PM | Comments (18)