Post Race Wrap-Up

So it ends, or does it?  Race say was amazing!  The whole weekend was good and I particularly enjoyed spending the time with good friends.  It was great to train and receive encouragement from them.  I don't think I would have ever done a triathlon if it weren't for Steve and Isaac.  

By the way, I may have slacked off on updating my blog the last few weeks before the race but I didn't slack off on the training.  The last 2 weeks before were filled with intense workouts almost everyday.   It took up a lot of time, along with finals, so I never took time to record and update my training.

My race time wasn't as good as I would have liked but I'm not too disappointed.  My swim was the biggest problem.  I wasn't really ready for it, I made the mistake of thinking I could sort of just get by with only doing a little training for it.  At least I learned my lesson.  I felt pretty good about the bike and transition times, although I could have done better on those if the swim hadn't worn me out.  Here are my times:

Swim:  50:56                                    Overall Position: 269 out of 333           

T1:       3:08                                      Division Position: 12 out of 13 

Bike:    1:07:58

T2:      1:32

Run:    1:01:49

Total:  3:05:23

As you can see, I didn't do all that well, but I got through it and I felt good afterwards.  Next time I'll do better.  That's right, there will be a next time.

The Location

The Finishers

The Finish Line

 The Action Shots

                     
                        

The Medal

Now that the SGTri is over, it's about time I get ready for the Bear Lake Mountain Tropic Half Ironman!

Isaac talked me into doing it with him in August.  I know it's crazy.  I'm also hoping that Steve, Isaac, and I can all do the Kokopelli Tri in September.  It's the twin to the SGTri.  Same course, different season.

Wish me luck!

Quick Update

This week has been a good one.  

Monday ~ 5 mile Run

Tuesday ~ 1hr Indoor Bike

Wednesday ~ 40 min Swim, 90 min Indoor Bike

Thursday ~ 24 mile Bike, 2.5 mile Run

There's still 2 days left this week as well!  Bring it on!

Time is Short!

It's been a while since I've updated anything on here.  I need to add in my workouts for the last 3 weeks!  With only 16 days to go it's important for me to stay focused.  The next 2 weeks are going to be intense with all the workouts I've got planned.  I'm going to push myself hard so that I'll be ready to go.

Two Saturdays ago was a beneficial day.  I did a bike ride with a few of my friends, 2 of which are doing the triathlon with me.  It was nice to ride with people and I definitely pushed harder than I would have if I was alone.  I think we encouraged and tested each other, and it made for a great workout!

Swimming is something I need to work on big time so that's what I'll be focusing on most this week.  Isaac and Steve got me to go last Saturday and I realized how much I need to improve.  So I went and bought some jammers and I'm ready to get to it!

Wish me luck!

To Get There

It's always nice to have some good music to pump you up and keep you going.  

Even when you're reading to quit.

Here are some of the artists that seem to help me when I'm working out.

Maroon 5 may seem like a weird choice but it actually works

Liam Keegan makes some really good remixes of popular songs.  He gives them a little........ boost.

This is a Japanese band that I found about a year ago and I really like them.  As you can see from the video, it's a good song for exercise.

These guys are Chinese.  The song is pretty funny if you know what they're saying.  It's from a Taiwanese Drama.

Wo Shi Superman!

This has got to be one of my favorite songs ever!  It's from the same Taiwanese Drama as the video above.  The show is about basketball, so that's what these lyrics are about as well.  However, the words are brilliant for just about any sport.  This video is the English version.  The original is in Chinese.  I'll post that below in case you want to see the actual MV.

Feeling Fizzled

Last week did not turn out as I had planned.  To start, I only got a few days of exercise in and not one of them was a swim.  The swimming is what I NEED to be working on.

On Saturday last week I had planned to do a group ride with a few of my friends, including my two fellow triathletes in training.  However, thanks to horrible weather we weren't able to go.  I was thoroughly disappointed.

This week is not looking so hot for me either.  I started feeling sick on Sunday and I'm still feeling it a little.  I tried to do some biking yesterday but my throat starting hurting too bad with my heavy breathing so I stopped.  I'm really hoping I get better quickly because I can't afford to  continue to take days off.

Hitting the Streets

Last Saturday was the first time I have gone riding outside this year!  I was so excited.  It was a little chilly and I kind of wish I would've taken my gloves.  I took my usual route and loved every minute of it.

  Yesterday was my birthday and it was a gorgeous day.  The sun was shining and there was a cool breeze, probably the perfect temperature for cycling.  Anyway, I decided to go for a nice ride to celebrate.  I headed up Little Cottonwood canyon with the intent to get some good climbing in and then just head home.  However, when I had climbed up a ways and zoomed back down I still felt like riding, so I just kept going and ended up doing a solid 30 miles.  It added to the splendor of an already great day!

Today I did another ride with Isaac.  it was a little cooler and a bit cloudy today but not bad.  Well, not until I was heading home from Isaac's and there was a killer head wind that made me work even when I was riding downhill.  Yeah, the kind that every cyclist dreads.  It's been a long time since I've had the opportunity to ride with anyone so it was really nice.  We didn't do a long ride because of time constraints, although it worked out well because my legs were a little tired from yesterday's ride.  I'm hoping I can get out with friends more often now that I have a few that bike and we're finally getting some good weather.  

One of the best parts about living in Salt Lake is that you have easy access to the mountains.  

I took these on my April 1st ride and I'm pretty sure it only took about 45 minutes to ride to 

this point.  The mountains are so beautiful and make for some really great training.  From my 

house I can get to 4 different canyon mouths within 30 minutes.  How great is that?!   

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Conquering the Mountains

So it's been a while since I've updated.  I don't really have anything too exciting to share.

A lot of that is due to the fact that the week before spring break (3/13/11-3/19/11)

I hardly did any training at all.  

It was a bad week.

School was just absolutely brutal with midterms and what not.

I had a test everyday for the first four days and then a quiz on Friday.

Basically I think I averaged around 4 hours of sleep each night.

So even the couple days that I had a little bit of time I was too tired to bother.

I did manage to watch a couple videos to hopefully improve my strategy when climbing hills 

during the bike section of the tri.

Here they are:

They're not the most informative videos but I gained a few things from watching them.

If you were wondering, during spring break, I thankfully was able to catch up on my sleep and get some solid work outs in.

You can check them out on my "Workout" page.

Product Placement?

I ate healthy today,

 and did an hour and a half of exercise.

(25.2 miles on the bike trainer)

While I exercised,

I watched this documentary,

and used the best biking shorts in production,

I had to throw that in here.  You can call it product placement.

So as a reward.....

This

...Confused?

Good, because I would be too.

That is me relaxing and watching the Jazz go into overtime against the Kings.

If you think I look focused here,

then you should see me when I ride my bike. Ha ha!

Day One Failure Leads to Success

Second Day of my 12 week training was intense.  It had to be; I missed day one because of 

an accidental nap that occurred.

  

I was home today at 3 o'clock so I decided to go for a run outside.  It was absolutely perfect 

weather outside.  Not cold but not hot.  With a nice cool breeze and the sun shining, it was a 

great day to be outside.

  

After finishing a little over 3 miles outside on foot, I felt so good that I did another 20 miles 

inside on wheels while I read a super long article (which I'm still not done with).  This helped me

 read without falling asleep.  So for all of you that are wondering, the moral of this story is that

 you get more accomplished when you do it all at once. 

[Okay maybe not with most things in life.  But it worked in this case.]

Along with working out I also added a few things to this blog today:

1. Article under the "Nutrition" tab

2. Created a new page for my favorite bike routes

3. Route mapper at the bottom of the main page

4. Route Search at the bottom of the main page

5. I cleaned up a few things to make them neater

One more thing

I was introduced to mynetdiary.com today by a friend.  I've been looking for ways to track

 my nutrition so that I eat properly and this is a good site that lets you do just that.  After 

signing up for this website however, I realized you can do the same thing on mapmyride.com  

which is where I kind of keep track of my workouts and map out routes.  Now I'll probably 

end up using both and hopefully I'll be able to post a link on here so that you all can see how 

I'm doing.

 

MyNetDiary.com

Sorry for the lack of actual pics on this blog, I had nothing I could really photograph. 

Glorious Disappointment

All last week I was looking forward to possibly riding my bike outside on President's day.  Then to my glorious disappointment it snowed over the weekend.  I say it like so because I absolutely love the snow but I really wanted to get outside and ride.  A bittersweet experience it was. 

   

But do not fear, I got a great ride in today and it's only mid afternoon.  I threw in some push-ups, crunches, and pull-ups for good measure.  The funny thing about it, after I was done and in the shower, I felt this urge to go running.  If I wasn't already showering I probably would have thrown on my winter gear and headed out.  I don't know where this energy comes from but I feel extremely good right now on this wintry President's Day!

God Bless America!