Couch to ATHLETE!

You know you had success when you wake up the morning after your triathlon and your not sore at all. Sure my shoulders are a little tight, and my calves needed to be stretched but for the most part I am not sore at all! I even went out for a run today if you can believe that. Yesterday was the big triathlon. At first glance I was disappointed with my time, but the more I thought about it and looked at previous times, I'm pretty darn happy with my performance. I got to run for about 2 minutes with my sister (which was fun) but then she blew past me. I had a great time cheering on all my friends, and dreaming up what is next. I have events lined up once a month through October, am looking for a Turkey Trot for November, and a Jingle Bell run in December, then I will feel accomplished for the year.

I was mentally preparing for the upcoming Chicago Triathlon on Sunday over the weekend, and this morning my sister called me to tell me how cold Lake Michigan is right now; a frigid 55 degrees. She also told me that one of our friends who will be participating in the race tried to rent a wetsuit, and while standing in line learned the store was out of rentals. This sent us into a fury to find wetsuits so we don’t all freeze our butts off while swimming. I made phone calls, googled wet suit rentals, rent wetsuits, where to rent wetsuits in Columbus, cheap wetsuits, Columbus Ohio wetsuit rental. And every other combination of words you can think of to come up with nothing. I then remembered years ago walking through a Sam’s Club store and running into wet suits. I went to Sam’s Club on line and learned most of the stores in Columbus sell wetsuits. If you know anything about wetsuits you know that they can be VERY expensive, but I hopped in my car and went searching anyway. I got to Sam’s...

Think about a time when you were in little league or some organized sport (or band) in high school and your coach is shouting at you in a gruff low voice: “Dig a little deeper.” You think “dude I’m doing the best I can;” however you start running harder, squatting lower, playing louder or simply focusing more intensely on your competition. Do you remember those days??? I do… I was getting ready to run yesterday with my best buddy Robert Ullrey, when he told me through my iPod I was going to run twenty eight minutes. If you have been keeping up with my blog you would know I have already participated in plenty of events so 28 minutes should be nothing. My response to all you very appreciated supporters would be thank you but you are so wrong. Every time I face a ten minute run I am stretching myself. I started my run and was feeling very good but at some point I lost my concentration and did the most painful thing you can do as a non enthusiastic runner; I looked at my watch… I learned t...

Let me start by saying I had the best workout today. So good in fact I think I will never have to work out again in my life!!! No I'm just kidding; at least about the second statement. I found inspiration in the weirdest place. I am going to admit something right now, that all of you readers must forget the moment you read it; I still watch MTV. Believe it or not I got my inspiration from the very channel that has made me lose all hope in the wealthy youth in the world; the youth who cry because their Mercedes Benz is off black NOT grey. So to the real story... I was watching MADE: I wanna be a rapper and there was this young lady who was over weight and had a revelation about life while rapping. She realized that she was a deep person who had confidence. She discovered this while she was rapping about her feelings. I have been learning more and more that I need to take care of myself and express my feeling when I have them. What made all of this even more powerful is that in the p...

but only champions have the desire to prepare." I found this quote when I googled Scott Tinley for quotes comparing triathlons to pizza (this is what I end up doing when I am banished to the backroom in a professional office because I walked in wearing cut off shorts and a tie dye t-shirt). The quote made me think of something that has been very difficult struggle time and time again. Every year I am determined to do my sprint triathlon at the end of the summer. In early spring I spend two weeks getting prepared to get prepared for the race. You may be saying Huh??? All this means; I make sure the bike works, find my bike shorts, see if my swimming suit fits, and create a training schedule that I SWEAR I am going to stick with "this summer." And this summer always turns into next summer. You see, I frequently find myself saying "Oh, I still have (insert number of weeks until the race) weeks so I can start training next week." This would be OK if the calendar co...

Wow, it has been quite some time since I have posted. I'M BACK!!! One of my favorite things about my sister is that she is always asking me if I want to participate in some random race with her while I am in town. As you know, this summer I've done a 62 mile bike ride with my cousin, a duathlon relay with my mom, and have been training for the Chicago Triathlon and a Century ride in October. Janell called me up about two weeks ago (knowing I was going to be in Chicago for a week) to ask if I would like to do a triathlon with her and Julia. I figured it would be a good training opportunity for the race in late August. I jumped on it. I was horribly unprepared, but woke up at 4:30 am to head down to Chicago and do my exercise thing. To my surprise 51 minutes later I was crossing the finish line. If nothing else I just got a practice run for the next race, and a bit of a confidence booster. Now I need to find a 5k in Cbus the weekend of August 15, 2009 and some type of swim event ...