And How Did I Look This Time?

Time for the Thursday-After-The-Race Photo Review... Although for Columbia, I did have the benefit of a couple of digital images that my mom took at the race, so I wasn't quite as anxious to see my photos as I was after Wildflower!


I generally like these photos, probably something to do with the 6:50 a.m. start and 9:15 finish, morning light is definitely more flattering than glaring mid-day light. I will say that I was disappointed that they only seemed to have one photo location for the bike, near transition, so there's lots of shoe-grappling going on in the photos and not a whole lot of wattage output! But at least you can see my nail polish if you squint...

Columbia Triathlon Race Report

I need to stop leaving races before results are posted... Yesterday I raced the Olympic-distance Columbia Triathlon here in Maryland. I was really pleased with my race and was curious about how my times were compared to other women, but it started to rain right after I finished and with 2000 participants, the race was a total mob scene, plus I was of course starving, so we opted to get out of there pronto and just "check results on-line in a few hours." A "few" turned into many which turned into me waking up several times in the middle of the night to hit refresh... finally saw the results at 8 this morning!

I had the 3rd fastest woman's bike split of the whole day (all divisions) at 1:09:14, 2 minutes behind Amanda Lovato and 1:15 behind race winner Rachel Wassner, and ahead of the rest of the Pro and Open and Age Group women. Woohoo! I thought I had a good ride but I didn't know it was that good! I am excited because since switching to triathlon last fall, I have focussed my cycling training solely on time-trialling, and it seems to be working. I feel much better about this ride than my ride at Wildflower, where I finished the race feeling like I went too conservatively.

I felt decent about my run yesterday too, there were 4 women in my Open division who ran faster. My time was 42:48, I wish I could say I ran faster than that but I have to remind myself that I have been training my run since only this past August. I have already improved a lot and I am actually really excited that I feel so good with my run at this early stage of my multisport career!

As for the swim... I swam a 29:33, which was :27 faster than my goal of 30:00. Oh and my wetsuit zipper split apart 8 minutes before my wave start! Thank god my aunt Glenn and a very kind stranger helped me get back together, I would have swum without it but I would have been a bit cold and I definitely wouldn't have made my time goal.

So my overall time was 2:24:48, good for 10th in the Open division. I am psyched about that, I knew that in such a strong field I would not be able to make up my swim deficit so the goal for the day was to have a good-for-me swim and then tear it up on the bike and the run. Also to have fun, which I totally did, especially thanks to my mom and my aunt cheering for me and taking pictures, and Greg greeting me at the finish.(Me with Aunt Glenn)

Anyhow, I really like the Olympic distance, and I can't wait till my swim improves even more and I can feel even faster out there! My next race, Battle at Midway, is another Olympic distance race and I am really looking forward to it.

Some Lessons

Today I learned two great lessons that I'd like to share.

1. Splish says that their white suits are not see-through, because they use a liner. So if I decide I want a white birthday suit to race in, I will not be indecent!

2. Pomeranians are vicious and apparently don't like bikes. They are also embarrassingly fast over short distances... one tried to eat me today on my ride and I only barely beat it to the top of the hill. (I was laughing while sprinting though, if that counts for anything).

In other news, I am basically just plugging along, getting ready to race again this weekend, and relatedly, getting ready to fly with my bike for the first time since Nature Valley last year (incidentally, I laughed as I just re-read that post... wow, the foreshadowing. I really didn't know it at the time that I'd be sitting here nearly a year later with exactly one bike race on my calendar). I got myself a spiffy new Akona Biospeed Bike Case and this will be its maiden voyage. I predict that I will be quite pleased with it, with my bike inside it will weigh less than my old case did when it was empty! I am crossing my fingers that this slim little case will help me shirk the bike fee. We'll see. I think it's totally bogus that they charge for bikes but not for golf clubs, so I have no moral dilemma here about whether or not to lie at the checkin counter. I doubt I can convince anyone that my bike is golf equipment but I might be able to say "massage table" or "paintings and art supplies" and get away with it. I will let you all know.

Additionally, I just realized that mathematically speaking, even in the *totally unlikely* event that I swim as un-stellarly at Columbia as I did at Wildflower, I will still get in under 30 minutes, which was one of my early-season goals: olympic swim in 30 mins or less. Because 39:39 for 1.2 miles is the same as 29:46 for 0.9 miles right? Yes I did take Calc BC... God if my teachers could only see me now, the 1996 GFS Top Scholar (girly version of Valedictorian), twelve years later she's pursuing an athletic dream and occasionally thinking on the side.

Maybe I should volunteer to visit the school and give a school talk about Your Future After Boarding School, I wonder if the administration would take me up on it ;)

Moment of Truth

I have been hitting "refresh" on the race photo site for Wildflower all week. Well lo and behold, my wishes were finally answered. I got to see what I *really* looked like out there.

Here I am on the bike...


And here I am responding to a complete stranger ordering me to smile 30 seconds after an only moderately glorious finish:

So the answer to "how did I look?!" is basically the same answer as "how did I race?!": not bad but definitely room for improvement. (I did not post the photos I didn't like, you know the ones with one short leg all pulled up, my face all scrunched, inadvertent belly shots, etc). I am not a fan of my hairdo. What do you long-haired ladies do with your hair on race day? My last two races I have done a low braid but UGH. Yuck. Feels like a mullet for girls. Maybe I will go back to my old bike racing standby, a half-pulled-through ponytail and just take the extra 5 seconds to pull it through my helmet.

This is a very important issue so stop laughing at me Greg, Loren, etc.

Also after looking at my photos I am wondering how my big old arms and shoulders could possibly not swim fast. Hmm. I am going to Columbia with the attitude that I am a speedy swimmer just waiting to be unleashed.

Wildflower Pt. 2: The Gory Details

The results page is currently a bit convoluted, times are all up there but it took some craftiness and persistence to deduce my overall results.

Swim: 39:39
Bike: 2:49:47
Run: 1:39:30
Total race time: 5:13:27

This put me in 4th for my age group and 9th overall. I don't know how many racers there were.

Anyhow let's start with the bad... I am capable of much better, not just in theory but really on Saturday I had the physical ability to go faster, particularly in the swim and the bike. I am not happy with my mental toughness because even though I pushed myself, I raced with fear and self-doubt in my head. I should not be handicapping myself in that way (don't need my mind to be a liability in addition to my swim!). I know that the mental side is the hardest, anyone can go out and train like mad but putting it all together come race day and really leaving everything out on the course is another thing entirely.

On the plus side though, I know I have improved a lot. My times were all better than my Silverman times, and both are hard courses. I am really pleased that I did not have a single panic attack during the swim, which is a major step up from my previous 3 races. On the bike I learned a lot about pacing and being too conservative. And on the run, I felt great for the last 6 or 7 miles and found myself smiling a lot. I had fun.

So now I am resting up and thinking a lot about the mental side of the sport in preparation for my upcoming races! Also if anyone wants to come hang out and keep me company up here in Tahoe please let me know. Kitty and I are running out of conversation topics, although he is being a very perfect furry companion by sitting with me wherever I am and letting me hug him and squeeze him and he's purring and generally being cute. He likes me.

Follow Up on last post

So, as you may have seen on Greg's blog, his foot xray came back negative for a fracture. This is good news, it means his foot is badly bruised but the sesamoid bone in there (apparently there are several sesamoids in the body?) is not broken. Current plan is for him to head to Charlottesville, VA next week, to stay at his parents' and to have access to a good orthopedic doctor in the area and to get swim stroke critiques from his dad and to generally HAVE FUN and MAKE ME JEALOUS. I love Charlottesville, it's where I went to college and lived for a couple of years after college and have a bunch of friends and rode a lot of ponies and was a radio superstar and fell in love with running and generally HAD FUN.

Lucky Greg!

I will stay here and play with Kitty and clean up the apartment and go to Wildflower all by my lonely little clueless self. And Greg is in big trubs because of the whole Wildflower Accommodations situation... Wildflower is famous for being the "woodstock" of triathlon, everyone goes to the park and camps for the race weekend and, according to video footage, they wear crazy outfits too.

I am not a camper. I do not camp. I spent a couple of months living out of a tent in Australia back in my youth and I had more than my fill. I do not camp. No freaking way. I especially do not camp and race at the same time. (Please note that an RV rental is not in my budget.) So ever since last year when Greg and I were discussing my race calendar for this year, I made sure he knew that I don't camp or sleep in cars and that the only way I'd do Wildflower is if I got to stay with him in the pro accommodations, which are cabins that are a 15 minute drive from the race.

Now of course I am all entered and ready for the race and my luxurious cabin has been whipped away from under me! Aack!

So I am going to get a hotel room in King City, 45 minutes away. Thankfully I have a friend who is racing and he is also not a camper, nor are a bunch of his racer friends, so I am not alone. Phew! Greg is still in trubs though. I will miss him, not just because of the cabin... I can't believe I am going to this big race without him. I was so looking forward to being there with him, supporting each other, and generally enjoying the sport we love together. I am crossing my fingers that he heals fast and is ready for a great race at Columbia... Although, if he is still injured, he can watch the race with my mom and help her figure out what on earth she is watching and when to cheer ;)! I guess there is always a bright side.

Race Report: Ice Breaker Sprint Triathlon

Woohoo first race of the season! Man I was nervous. But it was a good day, and even without my Greg Crutch, I survived!

I won the Women's Under 34 race, but there was a woman in the 35 and over race who had a faster time than I did. So, I finished second overall by 40 seconds to the woman who finished second overall to Eileen last year. Ah well. At first I was really bummed - I had a feeling she probably beat me but since the older wave started 7 minutes later than mine and I didn't take note of my time when I crossed the line, I had to stand around and wait for official results before I knew for sure. But now I don't mind. As Greg says, I didn't deserve to win.

Anyhow, the gory details:

I got to the race and immediately found Chris and Loren and, as promised, asked Loren a trillion questions about what to do. He sort of teased me for not setting up my bike with the shoes already clipped in, but when I told him I just got my new tri shoes on Wednesday and my 20 minutes of on-the-fly entries and exits since Wednesday basically left me feeling like a safety hazard, he snickered and then be'd quiet. Later I made fun of him back, because his "transition backpack" is the hugest 70 gallon Rudy Project Rolling Duffle ever.

After setting stuff up and jogging around for 10 or so minutes to warm up (no biking allowed since there was another race going on), I got half my wetsuit on and walked for like 20 minutes down across a bunch of hot sand to the swim start. Water level in Folsom Lake is clearly at a low point, which mystifies me considering how much snow and rain fell this year and considering that the water source for the lake is supposedly our snow-covered mountains. Also: dude from the gym was dead wrong, I didn't see a single log and the water was definitely not freezing, I would guess it was at least 60 degrees.

So then our race started, I lined up at the front but didn't do a good job of really sprinting into the water and very quickly found myself halfway back in the pack getting pulled and whacked, but I slowly got into a rhythm and managed to stave off my panic reflex. Out of my 4 open water swims to date, this definitely felt like my best. I felt like I actually managed to swim, to focus on good technique, and work on my sighting skills. Yay! I finished at least a few minutes behind the leaders, maybe more, but that's way better than it could have been. My real problem and mistake was at the end of the half mile swim - the race directors recommended that we take our wetsuits off in the shallow water and carry them up the LONG sandy run (I would guess 1/4 mile but don't quote me), and even though I watched men from earlier waves really struggle when they followed that advice, for some stupid reason I did it anyway. By the time I realized that my muscles were too jellied to take the wetsuit off quickly and to maintain my balance, it was too late, so I helplessly watched 5 smarter girls run past me and take theirs off further up the beach while I just struggled and tried not to topple over. NEVER AGAIN. Ugh.

On to the bike... this basically went well. I love my new bike, and I loved myself for taking the race website's advice and pre-riding the course yesterday. It was a twisty narrow rolly slow course, a cyclist's nightmare basically. But since I had a glimpse of it yesterday, I knew what to expect and managed a decent pace. But, and this is becoming my theme for the day, I made some mistakes. First, I spent an hour last night trying to put my SRM head on my bike in a way that it wouldn't slip and point straight down when I went over bumps. I thought I got it, but I totally didn't. I spent 6 miles of the bike reaching down and pulling it up and holding it with my hand before I decided it was fruitless and pointless. I should have decided that right from the get-go because it was such a distraction. Thankfully, after the race Loren showed me how I could improve my jerry-rigging with a couple of cable ties. Second mistake was getting complacent with my shifting - I shifted to my little ring while I was coasting around a turn into a hill (I should know better!) dropped my chain, tried unsuccessfully to shift it back on, and ultimately got off my bike to fix it. NEVER AGAIN. Ugh.

On to the run...As I rolled into transition, and dismounted my bike with my cycling shoes still on my feet (see previous safety-hazard note), I thought I heard the announcer say I was the first woman, but I wasn't sure. The bike course had two loops with no true turn-around point so I even though I had passed a ton of people I still had no idea where I was in the field. My transition went OK, I didn't forget anything but it took me longer to get my shoes on than it should have - side note they are brand new shoes and today was their maiden run, thank god it worked out well and I totally love them! - and off I went. The course was almost all on trails, and there were quite a few really steep up and down portions. I love this type of course, but I wasn't expecting it. My BIGGEST MISTAKE OF THE WHOLE DAY was that I didn't double-check the run format. I thought I had read that we did 2 loops of a 2 mile course, which would make sense since they had run a Baby Sprint race earlier in the morning that did 6.5 miles on the bike (one loop of our course) and 2 miles running (so 1 loop of our course, right?) As time wore on, and as the terrain got more and more difficult, I was thinking "god this is the longest two miles of my life!" and "I have to do this climb again?! Better not toast myself now..." and felt myself slowing. Finally I asked another racer, who told me we did only one 4 mile loop, and instantly I ran faster. I booked it to the finish, berating myself a little bit but there was nothing I could do at that point.

And how do I really feel about it?...

On the one hand, in case you hadn't noticed ;), I feel kind of like a jackass. I feel like I had like 3 minutes of unnecessary farting around (not literally) during the course of the race, and because of it I lost the race. But on the other hand, and in the grand scheme of things, I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to really learn what I need to work on. This is my third triathlon ever, and I am a long way from being smooth. I know that if I had won the overall race, my many mistakes would seem less important, less painful, and less urgent. I probably wouldn't have the determination to really fix my problems that I do right now, and this race would not have served its purpose of giving me much-needed lessons. I know I will be a better racer for this - and thank you Marit and Sarah for indirectly giving me this perspective!

Next up is Wildflower Long Course on May 4 - I am really excited, and I feel confident that I will have a great day!

San Dimas Pt. 3: Cheerleading!

So I earned an A+ for effort in my attempt to debate my way into starting today's crit. Unfortunately I got an F for efficacy? Because I didn't start. Ah well, there will be other races... and of all types of bike racing, criteriums can be the hairiest. Unfortunately, our team was harshly reminded of this fact today when an inexperienced rider slammed into poor Sharon (a.k.a. Shaz), took her and 2 other riders out, and broke Sharon's wrist. She didn't even apologize.

So awful how hours and months of work can get wiped away in a second. This has happened to too many friends recently, it's really sad and I feel depressed and speechless about it. What do you tell your dear friend who's sitting torn, bloody, broken, crying, and asking "why me?"... All I can say is I don't know but we all love you and here's a hot chocolate? Coincidentally, this morning I was telling Shaz all about Marit's recent crash and phenomenal attitude.

Poor Shaz. Like Marit, she did not deserve this.

Anyhow, on to lighter and brighter news:


I am now in Santa Monica playing with my favourite-ever not birthday present!! He's even bigger and better and funner than he was last September! I love Bob!

San Dimas Pt. 2: Currently a Question Mark?

Today's road stage was great and crappy. Great because I helped my teammates more than I thought I was capable of, saw the front and the wind and more front and wind, climbed hills at a trillion watts, and even felt like my descending skills improved from mediocre to mildly o.k. during the course of the race. Woohoo!

Crappy because I got dropped right when the proverbial crap hit the proverbial fan, my legs gave out when I and We needed them most... As I was chasing into a fierce headwind, a good 20 seconds off the back of a strung-out peleton, I saw the field round a corner and sure enough, it was my other 5 VAC teammates on the front, single file, chasing two High Road riders. I knew at that moment that my chances of chasing down that horsepower were pretty minimal!

Crappy also because, despite the fact that this is not an NRC race, and further despite the fact that there is no safety issue with tomorrow's relatively un-technical crit course (and our field is down to 66 riders now), I and 9 others got time cut! How silly! It's like the officials decided this is the World Championships of Stripmallland and They are going to Exercise their Non-exercising bodies' rights to Enforce Senseless Rules and Watch Girls Cry... I completely understand time cuts in big stage races where you have big fields and potentially dangerous courses, like Redlands or Nature Valley for example, but come on! This is a local race! Our field is not large, and the course tomorrow can accomodate everyone with no problem! Just let everyone race, seriously! I don't regret my race at all though. Yeah, if I had sat in and been a passenger all day, I'd have made it in with the group and I'd be starting tomorrow. But there's no point to that, racing as a passenger doesn't help anyone and it certainly isn't fun or gratifying.

So yeah, I am bummed, because the whole reason I am here is to race hard and take advantage of my one opportunity to contribute to the team this year, and now I don't get to race tomorrow. Greg is probably coming to pick me up tonight, although now I am having second thoughts about that... half the impetus for him coming to get me is he was having dinner with some triathletes, including Chris McCormack and his family, but now by the time I get there everyone will be gone. Plus apparently the brain trust that's running the official side of San Dimas released results that say I and the other time-cut girls have a GC placing, but the stage results indicate the time cut... so which is it?! Are we in the race or not?!

I shouldn't be so high and mighty I guess... Officials are probably underpaid.

San Dimas Pt. 1

Greg and I made it safely and happily down to San Dimas yesterday! All 450 (mostly) beautiful miles... Not a lick of traffic, either, which was totally nice. And we basically pretty much sort of left "first thing", as intended - 9:30 a.m. is pretty good for us actually.

But Kitty didn't want me to leave! He was holding my bike shorts hostage (Huntress I know these are last year's shorts, I only use them on the trainer I swear!)
I am sharing a room with my favourite roommate ever, Shaz, who is getting over a cold and her voice sounds like something out of the Godfather and she is currently on the phone with her dogsitter explaining why she didn't mean to insinuate that the dogsitter's ex was a ho, she was saying her dog was a ho, or something? I am not sure but it's hilarious, especially since she can't really talk.

Anyhow today was the first stage of the race, a 6k hillclimb time trial (this is the part where Greg laughs at how I thought I was a "climber" when I first started cycling, then I went to my first road race and realized my huge misclassification of myself). Mara Abbott won, followed by her High Road teammate Kim Anderson, and our very own Leah Goldstein finished third! Additionally, Godfather Shaz rode up the mountain in the 10th fastest overall time, pretty good for being at about 75% health-wise. It's all because of my simultaneously calming and invigorating roommate-influence of course. I had a good day too, finishing 37th out of 71 starters, about 3 minutes down on Mara, in a time that was over a minute and a half faster than my time on the same course in 2006!! Hooray for improvements! It was also marginally fun-ish to see my heartrate in the 180s for the first time in 6 months??

Tomorrow is the road race stage, an 8-loop circuit race totalling 56 miles. It's a bit rolling, and the race is always exciting because every lap has either a time-bonus sprint or a QOM sprint. I can't wait, bring on the sprints!

OK we are going out for dinner but first a glimpse of the San Bernadino mountains, indication of why I could never ever live in this megalopolis of cars and people and more cars that pollute to the point where you can barely see mountains that are just a few miles away:

Tomorrow

Tomorrow, Greg and I and a car full of STUFF will be driving from Incline Village all the way down to San Dimas, CA. I have adamantly repeated multiple times that we are leaving first thing, no doodling around with "oh let's go do a swim first" and "let's make a big breakfast" and "i have to finish packing" and next thing you know we hit the road at noon sharp and arrive at 10 pm after multiple pit stops.

Poor Greg, I keep repeating myself and he keeps repeating "O.K., I agree with you!" himself. Poor Greg!

Also poor Greg because the original plan was for him to stay in San Dimas with me and the rest of the VAC girls, to train and watch some racing and cheer and hang out. But, when I told him it would be 6 girls plus him all in 2 rooms, and we'd maybe do his HAIR and NAILS for him, and no there's no kitchen so we'll just go out for burritos and gossip about the race, he got (understandably) a bit gun-shy and formulated Plan B. So, now he is going to spend tomorrow evening with me and the girls in S.D. and then hightail it west, to the sandy peaceful shores of Santa Monica, where he will be able to sleep and train and do boy stuff in peace without having to fend off a bunch of sports bras and hair dryers!

But, despite this removal of my own personal cheering section and moral support, I am really looking forward to the race. It will be a great opportunity to get in a bunch of intensity, while helping my teammates and enjoying my favourite type of bike racing: stage racing! I am also slightly nervous, because my triathlon training is right on track but is devoid of some of the training that's really helpful in bike racing, for example sprints and VO2 work on the bike. When I did this race a couple of years ago, Alisha Lion not only finished 3rd in the well-contested overall classification, but she also went running after every stage! I am not quite in that rockstar category - I'll probably do a run tomorrow evening, and I'll do a run after Sunday's criterium, and hopefully an easy swim or two as well over the course of the weekend. But the bike race is the priority, I'll have tons of time to get in good swimming and running workouts in lovely Santa Monica all next week (YAY 50 meter outdoor pool and YAY multitude of running venues!).

Which reminds me: I better go buy some sunscreen.

Heroes in a Half Shell

Attitude of a Winner

"I can't wait till tomorrow, and we can get this thing over with."

Race leader Levi Leipheimer at the end of today's Tour of California stage regarding tomorrow's final stage of the tour. What grace! What charm! What a champion!

I need to write a blog but I am making Cookies

Tonight I had to make cookies. I am still making them actually. It's ok. Apparently they are delicious but I haven't been into cookies much lately, although I do admit to eating one at camp.

Separate topic, we just watched the Tour of California coverage on Vs. And I, of course, have some opinions and observations.

- Levi's resemblance to a troll annoys me and prevents me from rooting for him. Which is unfair, I know, he didn't choose his gene pool. So maybe it's an accumulated annoyance, beginning last year when they let him keep the yellow jersey in Santa Rosa even though his crash was pretty dang far from the finish. And today during his interview with Bob Roll when he was like "yeah, I didn't really go hard until 5k to go, and then [Gesink] and I made a deal" I found it kind of annoying too. Say something nice for crying out loud! For example "Gesink rode great today and towed my teeny slow bum up the climb and deserved to win esp since I sat there" or I guess that's not nice but still.

- I find it funny that Phil and Paul are now throwing around phrases like "look at big George, what a stud". Did they get a list of California-like phrases?

- SUPER COOL to see the Governator and Big Tom together on the podium in Sacramento yesterday!

- What's with the "Free Lamb of God DVD from the Jesus Christ Church of Latter Day Saints" commercials during a bike race?

- A downside to watching my favourite sport on TV: we discontinued HBO to get the sports package. So now we don't get Flight of the Conchords or Entourage reruns or Real Time, instead we get the Golf Channel and reruns of some Goldie Hawn football movie and 1 week with 1 hour of cycling a night.

- An upside: I get to watch my favourite sport on TV! Go Dave Z! Go Roman! Go Jens! Go Bissell! Go Creed! Go crazy fan with elk antlers on his helmet! Go Mari Holden, the cutest of Vs's bike-racer-turned-commentators!

Silverman Photos!

Looking confused heading towards transition - they had volunteers helping people pull off their wetsuits.
I put on my VAC jersey for the bike leg - wanted pockets to carry all my snacks!
After 70 relentless miles of hills, I won! As Dave Scott said, even the swim was hilly thanks to all that wind.

By the way, the word on my laptop is: BROKE. I need to replace the hard drive, and everything on the broken hard drive is lost and gone forever. The good news is that after a mere $325, the machine should be good for another 3 years! And the other good news is I still have tech friends who are willing to hook me up with all the totally legitimately acquired programs I lost.

(um, "artist" and "athlete" are my professions, like i can afford to buy that stuff!)

Silverman Half Race Report

I am currently in the Apple Store in Reno, waiting for my genius appointment, monopolizing one of their display laptops, and fending off dirty looks... So, perfect time to post my Highly Detailed and Fascinating Race Report!

Silverman was an incredible race. It is the only half-iron distance race I have ever done, so I have nothing to compare it to, but it really felt like a true test that pushed racers to their limits while taking them through some amazing scenery. I am already planning to return next year, and break my course record ;)

Which should be a reasonable expectation, considering that my swim should be much better by this time next year. I expected to have a slowish swim because it was only my second ever open water swim, and they started everyone together rather than separating out the women, but due to high winds that caused a big swell, my swim was downright Slow. No "ish" about it. Good news was I didn't have any freakout panic attacks like at Tinley's, and I gained a lot of confidence by the end. I exited the water with 152 racers ahead of me, but at least transition was pretty clear and it was easy to locate my stuff!

I started passing people as soon as I got on the bike. The course started out with rolling hills but relatively favourable winds. There was an out and back portion with a turnaround point at mile 23 (so, 33 miles to go after that), and this allowed me to count how many women were ahead of me. I reached the turnaround with 12 women to catch, one of whom was 10 minutes ahead. I slowly but surely reeled all but 2 of them in, and I was incredibly grateful to have this motivation in my head through the second half of the course because it was brutal. Steep hills, headwind, and 10 miles of this narrow headwindy and STEEP PITCHED bike path that felt worse than the Ridgecrest portion of Alpine Dam, for you Bay Area cyclists. Additionally, focusing on catching these girls also enabled me to NOT think about the fact that I'd have to run an inconceivable 13.1 miles after getting off my bike. This was a very good thing!

So, I got off my bike and started running and actually felt not too bad. Greg ran with me, because his back had seized up during his bike leg so he opted not to start the run, then he stretched and waited for me (for a long time I think...) and did his run at my side. We ran a pretty reasonable pace at first, this was a hilly course and I had no idea how full or empty my tank was, so I wanted to start out conservatively. I caught the first of the two girls at mile 2, the second at the turnaround at mile 8, and as I headed back towards the finish I saw that there were a few girls within 5 minutes of me, and they were running fast. But no way was I going to surrender my lead, so with five miles to go I started really running and that was that!

It was great. It really was.

There were so many volunteers out there - we had an aid station at pretty much every half mile of the run! I got lots of coke and gatorade all over my face, I will have to work on my aid station skills for next year. There were also tons of policemen making sure the course was safe, which was so nice - never for one moment did I feel like I didn't have room or like I was about to get squished by a motorist. And, for the last 5 miles, it was so incredible to hear all these women cheering for me. Even women who were racing! Up until that point I had been calling out encouragement to other racers, but at the end I was reaching my limit and then I started really appreciating other people's encouragement.

And one final bit of trivia regarding me and my horn-tooting race performance: after the swim, I passed 140 racers, and not a single person passed me. Man or woman. So that was cool.

Now it's time to buckle down and get ready for Oceanside 70.3 at the end of March!

The best of times and the worst of times...

I am feeling highly melodramatic, and for that I apologize, additionally I apologize for my long break from blogger, BUT:

1. I won Silverman! I won I won I won! It was awesome! Half-marathons sure are hard, especially after a few hours in the water and on the bike, but somehow even though I am still in pain from the race, I am still even MORE excited about how cool it was. I can't wait for next year.

2. Right now though it's back to the mundane...

3. I am actually sitting at a public computer at the Incline Village rec center

4. BECAUSE my stupid laptop finally up and died this weekend.

5. So did my camera.

6. Anyhow, thankfully (or not), I am still jobless so I have all the time in the world to trot down to the Apple store in Reno tomorrow and beg them to pretty please fix my laptop for me.

7. I'll put together an honest-to-goodness race report here pretty soon, for those of you who are interested in all the gory Silverman details!

Vegas Virgin

This is my first time in Vegas. Going from this:

through this:

to this:

...was a somewhat eye-opening progression. Or a depressing one, I guess. This country has such beautiful, beautiful things, and Vegas is not one of them. For one thing, the light pollution at night was visible from 170 miles away. I knew that the city was huge, excessive, and grossly American, but seeing it in person for the first time was still shocking.

But enough rambling about the obvious and the boring.

I am very excited about the race on Sunday. It takes place mostly to the southeast of the city, where it's hilly and the air is pretty clear. Conditions are supposed to be perfect. I feel fortunate to have opted against the Treasure Island Triathlon this weekend, because of the oil tanker disaster from earlier in the week. The swim portion of that race is likely to be canceled, making the event a duathlon (bike and run only) - this would cater to my strengths for sure but it would not give me the open-water race-situation swim practice that I desperately want heading into next season.

Amusingly: the check-in lady at the hotel asked if we were here to get married and whether we needed a wedding chapel or something. We were both like "ew gross".

Tinley's Race Photos

Out of the Water! Those are actually kids behind me, racing the kid's triathlon. The swim was not really my strong leg but the race wasn't over at all.

That's my "GAH!" face!

Now I am out for revenge on all those little swimmer-experts... In looking at this photo I am deciding to try to get a bike with 700 cc wheels, my cute little Elite looks too little! What do you think?

This part of the race was pretty fun. I do love running.


Here I think I am still loving running, but perhaps a bit less than in the previous photo? I am making that face again!

Thanks to Lorri for all the great photos! Oh, and finally, *sigh*, here is my favourite... Greg getting interviewed after his awesome win!

Actually, I kind of WAS the Cat

"It's hot and I'm starving. Let's get out of here."

"But PLEASE can we go check my result? I think I see them posted over there. PLEASE?"

"Ugh. Why? They're going to be online tonight. Let's just look later."

"PLEASE?!"

This was me and Greg yesterday after the Scott Tinley's Triathlon and after the pro awards ceremony. Major excitement of the day was that Greg won the pro race, it was a strong field and he had a great day and won it decisively, by nearly two minutes!! SOO, verifying that I did indeed have a mediocre-slash-terrible swim leg at my first triathlon was arguably lower on the priority list than getting lunch and getting the 230 mile drive home over with.

HOWEVER, we compromised, I trotted over to the results board, saw that I actually won my age group, made Greg re-park the car, dug out a Ritchey hat, replaced my Target sunnies with my Rudy Project race glasses, and headed back over to awards in time to get a plaque, a podium presentation, and 3 french fries.

Anyway here is a sort of brief recap of the race, in case you are curious:

- Swimming in a big murky lake with a bunch of wetsuit-clad chicks is NOT THE SAME as swimming in a nice clean pool with lane lines and 2 other people in your lane. NOT the same AT ALL. I looked like the kitty...

- But after 15 minutes of pathetic breastroke/laying on my back trying to breathe, I managed to stop freaking out and start swimming. I even passed some people somehow. The one-mile swim took me 41 minutes to complete, when it should have been less than 30!

- Then I got on my bike and set out to at least have the fastest amateur female bike split, since I feared my swim put me out of contention for anything else. I did indeed have the fastest bike split, and I was apparently faster than half of the pro women as well. It's nice to know that my cycling hasn't gone completely down the tubes with all this other training!

- Then I ran a blessedly pain-free 10K, my longest run in nearly 2 months due to my knee injury. I passed several girls in my age group, the last one was the most tenacious, but I had no idea that this put me in first place!


O.K. As Martina said yesterday, I guess I am officially a triathlete now!