Sunday, February 19, 2012

Tough Love


Another weekend in the pain cave.

Another spinervals sweatfest.  This one was called Tough Love. 

It was kinda tough....2 hours into the ride a guy fell off his trainer.  I'm not sure if it was a trainer malfunction or rider error.  Either way he managed to wipe another guy out and do some nasty damage to his own arm and shoulder.  Scary considering we haven't even made it outside to ride and people are getting injured.

On the training front, this build phase has certainly made me more tired than usual.  Yesterday was a long swim /bike /run brick.   I ran off the bike and my legs were feeling really good.  Today I woke up and my body felt tired...not sore...just fatigued.  I had a long run followed by a trainer ride on my schedule and I had put the workout off all morning. Finally I knew I just had to get it done so I threw on my running shoes and off I went. The first 30 minutes of my run my legs were stiff...almost as if they had forgotten how to run....and my brain was doing its best to negotiate an early end to my workout.  But then it occurred to me that maybe all this training was just as much about getting my mind into shape as it was my body. 

Endurance racing is such a mental game. I think you can train your body to go the distance but ultimately it is your mind that gets you across the finish line. 

I learned that lesson today...and I completed my run and my ride.

Tough Love indeed.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Visiting the Pain Cave.


Triathlon seems to be experiencing a surge in popularity.  Great news for our sport as it gets more exposure and support.  I think those kind of things have been really helpful to a grass roots tri club like ours. Our membership is booming and we have been lucky in securing a lot of really great sponsors for 2012.  One of these sponsors is The Bike Hub, our local bike and multisport store.  Amongst a whole lot of other things, they offer our club use of their basement spin room.  Its a massive space complete with a huge flat screen TV, countless spinerval DVDs, fans, trainers...you name it.  And of course one of the best things is immediate access to a mechanic should that be required.

A group from our club workout there Tues/ Thurs and Saturdays every week over the winter.  Finally this Saturday I had a 1hr 45min spin on my schedule so I decided to give the Bike Hub Basement a go. 

Now I know what the term "pain cave" refers to.

A friend who was visiting the pain cave snapped some pictures of us.  Yes, that's me on the far right. I know it looks like I am praying...praying for it to be over.


Afterwards  my legs were like jello, but it was the best bike workout I have had in months.  Way more focused than anything I would do at home by myself.  So it looks like Saturdays in the pain cave will become a regular thing for me :-)

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Portraits, portraits everywhere

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I haven't spent too much time with my camera in the last 12 months. So I took the opportunity on vacation to catch up on a bit of portait taking.

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Saturday, February 4, 2012

Hello and Goodbye

Goodbye to this....

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And hello to this....

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Time to get to work.


Seriously


I am starting the first build phase of this training cycle and looking ahead at my plan I can see some much bigger volume than I have been used to over the last few leisurely months. I know it will be challenging but I really feel ready. In fact I'm almost giddy with excitement about it. Must be Ironman Fever :-)

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Whale of a Time

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Excuse the cheesy title...(I obviously didn't quite get the creative juices flowing adequately this morning), but I HAD to share an amazing experience from our trip to Maui.


Whales


Humpback whales in fact

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During the summer they spend their time off the coast of Alaska, feasting on all the Pacific goodies up there. Then once the winter hits they migrate south to warmer waters to breed. They come to the shallow waters off Maui...up to 3,000 each winter and put on a display that will take your breath away.



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{ a mother and newborn baby...Mom is spouting the water...you can see her dorsal fin and her baby's next to her}

 
Now keep in mind that these things are huge...the newborn babies are 1.5 tons. The adults can be up to 50 or 60 feet and about as many tons. CRAZY BIG. And yet they can propel themselves out of the water at incredible speeds and produce a spectacular breach and dive back down again. And the wonderful thing is you can sit on the beach at this time of year and see this happen all the time. You can see them spout water out of their blowholes and slap their tails on the water. SHOWOFFS. But seriously, this is so much better than any aquarium or zoo you can imagine.

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{these whales came up to us in the boat...they we so close you could have leaned over and touched then}


Another very cool thing is being able to hear the whales calling and singing to each other when you are swimming under the water. This is a video Matt took while he was snorkelling. He didn't film any whales but if you listen to the audio you will hear the whales singing.