slower ;-)

hahahaha! thats what i get for mentioning how awesome i was on sunday.


didnt last long. i use the royal 'we' a lot in my posts because it is both me and the resa doing everything together. we like to run, swim and bike together. we are about the same speed in all events give or take some effort. but on any day it is beyond weird how totally equal we are. i can be faster or slower on all three events with the same amount of effort we are that close. once a few months ago we got separated at a half marathon and ran it about 70 secs apart as far as time goes.

so i usually write up a bit on how she is doing as we really are teamed up about 99.8% of the time.

so sunday i was feeling pretty darn great.

monday: found out my best client is going out of business and i probably have to find more software work. kinda a bummer. the resa's knee fell apart on her for no reason and totally unexpected and could hardly walk ( we skipped several workouts the rest of the week ) and lastly my brain scan came back and i have some tumors in my head - which is also a bit of a bummer.

so, the week started out a bit icky and stayed that way for most of it. on friday we finally got back to trying hard. we kinda dabbled in working out the other days - just didnt have the mojo.

friday went well, and then the weekend comes and to pick our spirits up we go shopping! i ended up with a new set of bike pants. ok - some background on this. about 12 years ago i met the resa. after a few hours we decided to get married in vegas by elvis and then she told me i would have to learn to ride a bike.

and i get on this old 1990 mountain bike. weighs about 45 pounds and i go riding on the green monster. our first ride was called Zoo-de-Mac. its a ride about 50 miles for partyiers and newbies. you ride 50 flat miles and get on a boat at the end and ride to this island called mackinaw in michigan. sounds like fine fun so i agree to go. she has done it a few times and is a biker. so we start off. i take the bike out of the truck, get on and ride! wooohooo!!! for about 4 miles. then i am gassed. totally blown out. i gasp out how much farther it is. she says something like 49 miles. and i stop. biking is not for me. well, we sit there the two of us and i am thinking its about 4 miles back to the truck. i can drive up and meet them. and she is looking at me and the bike.

"put any air in the tires?" she asks

"air?" i ponder

"well, there is plenty of air OUTSIDE the tires, did you put any in?"

"in the tires?"

they are both totally flat. she has a small bike pump on her bike. and since they didnt lose any air the rest of the day - i am sorta guessing they started out flat.

so we ride ride ride the brutal flat no wind 60 degree day to the island where my legs fall off.

but!!! my butt was not sore. at all. which now i think is pretty shocking. and remembering back to the green monster ( which later broke friends bones ) i remember the seat is about the size and shape of a barker lounger.



i think it even had the wood handle on the side that makes the feet thingy go up.

so i changed bikes 3-4 times in the last 12 years. but... i kept the seat. that monster seat just jumped bike to bike. it wore out a bit = looks really nasty now, and i got a LOT of comments on it through the years. so with the latest bike ( about a month ago ) i switched seats finally. swapped out the 1980s ginormous seat with a thin sleek thing.

this helped my legs move better - rather than feeling like i was riding a horse all the time my legs now go straight down to the pedals - which as i use the aero bars more now than ever is pretty huge. tried 2 different seats as the first was pretty painful. the second was not. was pretty nice. hurt after about 80 miles but so did the old one. so i would call it a draw on pain and a win on efficiency.

3 days ago i bought a my first bike shorts. ( i know insane ) but all along i didnt need them as i had the UberSeat. just figured even lance armstrong wears bike shorts, how faggy could it be? was great. really great. i think i am going to wear them every ride now. ( i know i am like 10 years behind the curve here )


so - anyway. the resa's knee is pretty focked up and we were planning on a 100 mile ride saturday. going out there we decided on a 40 mile slow ride. but as happens when you feel good... you go a little more. she felt great - if nervous. and we ended up with a 95 mile fairly fast ride.

learned a lot about eating on the ride. we as an experiment ate the whole time. goos, candies ( first ever snickers - thanks julie! ) sadly the snickers was a bit of an effort as it was 99 degrees out and it was a puddle of goop. but you can sqeeze it out like a goo packet. all sorts of other stuff to eat too.

and it was the best i have EVER felt for riding over 40 miles. after 95 miles i felt like it was a 20 mile ride. seriously - both of us were feeling great! wow - what a huge difference that made.

we felt so good we went home and jumped in bed and..... !! !! slept.

got up the next morning and went running - we ran 13. then swam 2.

but i was dehydrated from the day before and she was without dinner and pretty much breakfast too.


and some thoughts on "Tired":

after trying to get to tired we have come up with this set of thoughts:

A - dehydrated: not enough water ( me ) and you have a lot of energy, but every time you start running again you start breathing hard. your heart needs to pump a lot of less efficient sludge through your body. so if you feel strong and get a high heart rate - drink.

B - bonked: not enough food in your body ( resa ). you are not out of breath but have dead legs. - eat!

C - hurt: cramped/hurt/pain: well, this is pretty item specific, so not much to say here.

D - lame: mentally dont want to do it. need to watch some ironman videos before the workout!



SCORES:

mentally: 6 - had a pretty tough week outside of training. ahh well.

physically: 9 - no injuries, tired from weekend workouts. feel good.

workouts: 7 - skipped some with resa's knee, made up with great weekend!