Post IM 70.3 Cartagena blues.... err Report

Last year, after we finished IM Cozumel while we were exploring the streets of Mexico City an announcement came up on Facebook that Ironman was coming to Colombia. It was a 70.3 distance and was going to be held in the beautiful city of Cartagena. Without much hesitation we called my brother and sister and they were already making plans.
We came back from vacation and by then Brian, whom we were traveling in Mexico with, had already convinced his wife to let him do it and to plan a vacation. So the planning started on our end. My family came to visit us over Xmas so we were able to get some details in person. My sister had a friend who owned a couple of condos in the City so that was the main thing. Getting that squared away since it is the most expensive of all. The next thing we had to worry about was getting there. For us was relatively easy. JetBlue flies direct to Cartagena from JFK at a reasonable price without too many additional charges. The bikes are also one of the cheapest of any carrier, however due to the military status they were free for us. Thank you Uncle Sam.

Our vacation started to take shape when my sister moved to Medellin, JetBlue flies to Medellin as well though FLL and since Adriana had never been there and I was there about 20+ years ago we then planned to go there first and head to Cartagena with her and my parents since they were going to meet us in Medellin to spend a little longer with us.
Medellin will be probably another blog entry on either one of our blogs but I’ll try to focus on the race for this one.  

Getting to Cartagena:
Since we were flying from Medellin, we took a domestic Avianca flight to Cartagena. One way was about $100 each and Avianca being the official airline of the race was taking our bikes for free. Little parenthesis here, TriBike transport announced in October they were taking bikes, but since it was so late for it they couldn’t get the 50 min bikes needed to transport them. It all worked out, but definitely something that the race needs to work on. There were enough groups from the USA that would’ve benefited from the service and for most that were traveling on extended vacations having one less headache would’ve been ideal.  

Once in Cartagena bikes and all, arrived decided to get a big van service. It charged us about US $17 to take 6 of us and 3 bikes. If we would’ve split into UberBlacks might have been about $20 each and needed 2, and forget about taxis, that would’ve been probably $30. So it all worked out at the end. In terms of logistics I think we were pretty lucky. We flew to Cartagena on Thursday 12/1 in an attempt to get acclimated to the weather. Not sure if it worked or not, I might need more time for that after a few fall/winter weeks at home.  

The Expo Shenanigans:

The expo opened up on Friday at 10 am. Guess what... everyone had the same idea, get

the expo out of the way as soon as possible. We stood in line unnecessarily for about 2 hours, luckily it was inside the Convention Center but still we were standing. People that arrived much later were done a lot faster. Only downfall was that the race shirts for women were gone and also the race bag color were limited by then. No biggie, we did some shopping at the IM store since we learned our lesson that most of international races don’t make it out to the regular IM store website, so rather get it or forever hold your peace.  Only time we buy finishers gear before the race and ignore the superstition.

We had done a short out and back ride earlier that morning on the route since our condo was on the route, we did about 18 miles out and back. You go through a toll booth on race day so we just returned right before the toll booth. It was HOTTTT and we got a feel for what it was going to be on race day. Some folks that had done the route said that after the toll booth there were some false flats and the 2 climbs of the route (more on that later).  

Saturday:

We did a little ocean swim again to get a feel for the water, we knew it was going to be different since the swim happens at a bay next to the convention center, so the water is a lot calmer than just open ocean.  Then we went to get the bikes to transition and dinner with the family. Luckily we had 4 of us plus Maria Claudia and Maribel going to transition together and they had a cab that was behind us protecting us because riding on the roads can be a bit scary sometimes. 

Race Day

Race day started with everyone doing their morning rituals for breakfast and all that good stuff. The house was still kinda quiet. No one really talked to each other, everyone was concentrated on their own stuff and things were just moving along. Getting our number tats on and packing up the nutrition. We were so concentrated that we forgot about our sherpas' nutrition and hydration for them. Note to self, always remember their needs too.
We scheduled 2 vans to take the 9 of us to the race start at 4:30 am, so by 4:30 am we were leaving the building. By 4:50 we were in transition. We then set it all up, we had frozen all our bottles since we knew by the time we got to the start everything would've been melted and wouldn't been hot as hell. Nothing worse than warm Infinit. Pumped air on all 4 bikes, set up transition and got everything set. Then it was the waiting game.

The swim:
Race was technically supposed to start by sunrise. However it got delayed. We didn't hear why it got delayed, all we thought was every minute it is delayed now it is more heat and more sun that we will get. By then our Sherpas had taken their positions and we were by the convention center area where everyone was gathering. Our early hydration was done, and the heat was starting to climb. The wait seemed like forever. I came to find out when we were leaving at the airport from another athlete  that the wait was because the buoys that were moving.


 Anyways the canon for the pro's went off and then our waves started to move. My sister, Adriana and Margo were within the first 10 waves, I was 17 out of 20. I wasn't worried about the cutoffs, I was just worried about the heat. Finally my brother and I got in the water. He was swimming with a friend that had OWS fear, so since he wasn't doing the bike then he helped him through the swim. Once our horn went off I waited about 10-15 seconds and started my swim. We were swimming east first so we had the sun in front of us. Our ROKAS performed great but still once the sun is in front of you it just gets annoying. I followed the buoys on the way out to the turn. Once at the turn I knew I was in better shape. The sun was then on our left and by the second turn it was going to be on our backs. I reached the second turn and I went a little wide which cost me swimming maybe 200 yds extra and of course cost me the PR on my swim. My swim split was 40:40 (146 out of 320, finally towards the front of the middle  :), with an avg of 1:47 /100 yds. A little slower than I expected it, I wanted to go sub 40 but I didn't pay attention to it. Got out of the water, the volunteers did great pulling us out of the water, my zipper on my speedsuit got stuck so I couldn't unzip myself. I went to one of the girls and asked her to help me, then I saw my dad and threw the goggles and cap to him. The run to T1 was about 250 meters. Luckily for me I was right at the entrance of transition and since my brother didn't have his bike and was next to me I had some room. I was surprised that most of the bikes on my rack were still there, my T1 was pretty simple, put on the race jersey, helmet, glasses and nutrition. Shoes were on the bike since I knew I had to run out a bit so I didn't want to run on the shoes. T1: 3:41.



The Bike: 

By the time I started the bike it was hot. I had a Gatorade while I ran out of T1 and got on my way. Leaving the city the road isn't great but isn't too bad either, my plan was to settle myself in a rhythm by the time we got out of the busy area which was past our condo. So I was 7 miles just focusing on staying on the bike, road and others around me. Once I got to the divided highway I started the nutrition. The heat was hitting hard, so it made taking in nutrition hard. I kept looking for the girls to see if I saw them going down but I didn't. I saw Claudia, then finally I saw my sister near the turn around. I did the math and she was maybe 5 miles up the road. The bike course is not a flat course. It has a few rollers and then towards mile 25 it has 2 climbs, when I got to the first one I dropped my  chain mid climb, got off the bike and fixed it quickly, so didn't waste too much time. Then got to the second climb and at the top was the turn around. I kept my power where I needed it, 75-80% so I knew I was in good

shape. I actually tried to dial it down a bit since I knew the heat was going to take a  toll on me and there was no way I could keep up. As soon as I turned around I saw Margo, she was doing well, then down the road my sister, chatted with her a bit and 2 bikes down I caught up Adriana. The 3 girls were trucking along. I had about 7 miles and bike traffic got congested. Couldn't pass and it just seemed like it was taking forever to go through those 7 miles. we had a short rain shower earlier that cooled us off a bit but it just increased the humidity. I saw a friend of my brother and we tagged along (keeping a distance) or a bit, but it was too congested so I just stayed back, didn't want to get carded or anything. Officials were all over, they had a ton of motorcycles on the course with officials, I didn't want to get penalties or anything. No drafting means no drafting. My bike was a PR bike by a few seconds, with a 2:48:57 and avg of 19.975 mph I was pretty happy with it. Riding with power and sticking to it really has helped because I got off the bike and had legs which in the past that has never been the case. I usually hammer the bike and start the run with dead legs. I came back to transition put my socks on, got my hat and shoes on and off I went. T2 was faster than T1 with a 2:54 time. 

The Run:
Oh the run. I came back from the bike and while I was feeling pretty good, I wanted to get into a conformable pace. By comfortable I didn’t want to push sub 10:00/miles right off the gates. I wanted to take some hydration, cool my body off a little and see what damage I could do on the run. The first kilometer right off transition is outside the wall and you enter into the walled city right after the first aid station. While running that part, I saw Angela (my sister) and Adriana come in, I knew they were safe and sound back home. I hadn’t seen Margo but I knew she was probably another 30-40 minutes behind them according to my math. I managed to get some Base Salts in me and water on me. The sun was hitting hard on us, and by the time we entered the city no wind, just sun, heat, humidity, and more heat. 

The streets were packed with tourists, cheering crowds, DJs at the aid stations cheering us, it was pretty fun to run through the city. Finally I saw my mom standing and Claudia, Shayla and my dad in the back, I have my mom the biggest sweaty wet hug I have ever given her when I saw her. She then sent me off, saw them back on the return and asked for my sister and brother. I knew my brother was jumping again into the race to run with my sister to take her from the bike to the finish line but I hadn’t seen them. My dad said they were already together. I then saw  Adriana, she was going out on her first loop and I was coming back. She had lost her Base Salt vial, I gave her mine, I knew I could just finish it without it. She looked strong but was missing the salts. I saw my brother and sister and they were shuffling away, lastly I saw Margo, she looked pretty good, but I knew the bike had taken a toll on her,

however once on the run I knew she will get it done. As you are returning on your loop they take you on the wall for about 1 kilometer, at the top of it they give you sponges, however it is probably the hottest part of the race. Imagine a 500 year wall made out of limestone at noon. That thing is HOT!!!!. The first time I went through it fine. I got my sponges and got out as quick as I could. Then I went to finish my first loop and get back into the second loop. I started talking to a few guys and we kept motivating each other, but the heat was just taking casualties. I got back to my parents and I wanted to look strong, so I was attempting to run those stretches, the walking was a lot more on that second loop. Once I got through the second part of the wall I looked at my watch and I just went for it, I was 2 kilometers out so I was just committed to run to the last aid station and then from there get a sprint to the end. 

The finish was packed, they take you under the clock tower and there is where the food and medical tents are. I finally found a place to sit next to a pool full of cold gatorades and ice. I just dumped the towels they gave me in that and cooled my self down. Saw Maria Claudia and Diego (buddies from Texas) then Adriana came so we just stayed there to rest a little. Then my sister came up with my brother, took a picture but she could hardly stand up, she was really struggling with the heat so we went to cool her off immediately and lastly Margo showed up. 

We all finished what we had started. A race that we prepared for all year, a season well planned, no injuries, great shape, strong in all 3 disciplines. We knew it was going to be hot, just wasn’t expecting it that hot. Was it a PR? No it wasn’t, I still got my PR at Atlantic City, did I want a PR? Yes I did. Did it matter? No. To me what mattered the most was being able to spend 2 weeks with my family, race with Adriana, my brother, sister as a family and of course our plus 1… Margo who became part of the family on this trip.

In general, for those looking to do Cartagena, I highly encourage you to do it. I really hope that Ironman continues it. Cartagena is a city that if you plan your trip well it caters to the tourist and to the families. Does the organization need to tweak things, of course they do. It is the first time an event of this size comes to the city or even the country. The pros had a fiasco with their running routes…

A year of 3's

It's been a while since we did an entry, it sucks when real life and grown adults stuff gets in the way of fun. Our year has been crazy busy with work, life and the usual nuances of adulthood. Our workout life has been pretty uneventful, since we are keeping our racing limited we don't have as many exciting things to share when it comes to triathlon... You get us... We hope.

So what have we been up to, not much... Honestly.  Back in February we did our 3rd half marathon. Our 2nd time doing The Cowtown. It was a run that we did to keep a tradition we are trying to start to do The Cowtown and try to get our medal display that they normally have after you run a few of them. This time is 3 medal display, so we are only 2 away :).

Anyways, it was a run that we had not trained much for. Last year if you remember we wanted to close the year with the Dallas marathon! that clearly didn't happen and the wheels fell off after that. We couldn't get our motivation to run or do major workouts, then family in town, the holidays, the cold weather, the really cold weather just added up to no motivation and lack of training. Well.... Guess what... Lack of training sucks when you try to run a half marathon or try to run... period. We had a long run before it of about 10 miles, we felt pretty good but we knew we were not in for any PRs. But we were fine with it, we know we have a long year ahead of us and we are taking it slow. With our races this year, going and killing a super fast half Mary is great but it is not worth at the end with the recovery and how much it would hurt. So we did it... Puli managed a PR by a little over a minute and I managed to finish not walking, not a PR but surely felt every mile of those 13.1. 

We know it's not an excuse, but the cold weather really messed us up this year...we will pay for that in the summer but for now we just want warmer temps. So finally we feel like we've been getting to a constant good volume of workouts, not 100% but more than 50%. We are feeling stronger on our swimming and biking but our run has suffered a lot since we haven't done much of it, crappy weather means not going outside to run.

On Sunday we are going to our 3rd Half Ironman. It will be 70.3 Ironman Texas. We know it is going to be an interesting race, we've had a couple of confidence booster workouts where we feel awesome about it so we will see. Last year our volume was really starting to peak for ironman Texas and burn out was also kicking in, so this year we feel we are more rested so hope that it actually translates to bodies more recovered, we will see... Stay tuned for updates on it.

By now you probably saw the trend... A year of 3s. 3rd half marathon, 3rd half ironman, and you got it, 2nd AND 3rd Full distance with Challenge Atlantic City and Ironman Arizona. Our peak will start probably when we come back from Galveston next week, it will be a good gauge but unlike last year we don't feel burned out. We are trying to keep ourselves from triathlon burnout as we still have 7 months of heavy workouts. A lot can happen and getting injured ain't going to be one of them. :)

So... For now... Hope you haven't missed us too much, we will try to do better, hopefully you will get to see more of us either here or on Res' blog and we can share more of what we've been up to. Hope you enjoy these videos we are leaving you with. After all we TRI to have fun and we pay to have this fun... Might as well... Enjoy the ride :)

Volunteering and Diagnosis confirmation... we are C-R-A-Z-Y

Wow, it's been a wile since my last entry. Been a bit hectic with work, holidays, and work travel, hate when real life gets in the way of fun stuff :), just kidding.

Picture with the one an only Mike Reilly

When we finished our first ironman, and the weeks after that one when we made the decision that we would do another one we had said we will do Ironman Arizona. However the trick to that one was that you have to volunteer in order to get in otherwise you are leaving it up to the cyberGods and destiny to be able to get in and that your computer doesn't crash in the 45 seconds it takes to sell out. Yup, there is crazier people out there that camp online. So we decided that not only we were doing it but we were going to volunteer at it. June rolled in and the volunteer openings opened up. Even though these are free of charge they are very strategic. There are some that are called "speedpass" spots and others good ol' regular volunteer spots. So Felipe and I signed up for 2 volunteer spots each.

Bike handling and pointing runners. It meant working from noon until midnight straight, reason for this was that the pointing runners shift was a "speedpass" shift which meant that we would get especial treatment and a separate line on the day after the race to sign up. Fast forward from June to November and ironman weekend arrived. We decided to drive to Tempe, AZ which wasn't too bad. We left Thursday and the plan was to take Friday and Saturday pretty easy, getting to know the town, and being on vacation. Tempe is a pretty cool town and really welcomes the athletes. On top of that there was a ASU vs OSU game and my Beaver Adopted Fan was all happy (aka Felipe). He spent enough time in Corvallis and his company was founded by OSU alumni so he is a Beaver fan by default :). We attended a slowtwich party at Tribe which was pretty cool, they had some of the pros there, giveaways, food, beer, it was such a good tri community, we even got to meet some of our twitter and Instagram friends there and Felipe won a Cervelo cycling kit to match his Cervelo :). Were also able to run a portion of the run loop and got a feel for it, couldn't complain too much.

The calm before the storm... of bikes

Sunday rolled in, we got up kind of late since we knew it was going to be a looong day. We went to watch some of the bike before going to start taking bikes. Those guys were flying and of course we were getting so pumped. We saw some other twitter friends from Texas that had volunteered at wetsuit stripping and then headed to our post. We didn't really has much time down, pros got in like at 12:30 and we didn't stop racking bikes until 5:00, put in 7 miles according to the garmin. It was cool to get Jordan Rapp's bike or Amanda Steven or all the other pros and also support the "mortals" age groupers that hardly can get off their bikes or that simply want to sell it or told us to. Got to see Congresswoman Kirsten Sinema come in a bit wounded but in good spirits. We finished at 5 and promptly reported to our second shift. Of course after getting our volunteer wristband. The second shift while physically was easy, emotionally was hard. It brought so many memories from last May and also was hard when the cutttoff arrived,we got to see the runners cut off at 9:30 and then at 10:30, it was devastating because we knew that it could've easy been us last May and we don't know how we made it. We also saw Danang our teammate that was racing, we then met him after he had finished. He was standing and looked tired, but he looked relatively ok. We had told him we would take his bike back to Texas so we had to get it from him before headed to the hotel to debate if we were going to jump on it or not.

So here is where the diagnosis became effective "We are CRAZY," and here is why. We get back exhausted after working 12 hours straight, and we knew we had our "speedpass" so at least we would get in, now the debate was if we could do 2 Iron distances in a year. Not only it sounds crazy to train pretty much 11 months out of the year, but we had to understand the toll it would take on our bodies, and life would be huge (Tri life 100% on 2014) We then said that we probably won't have an opportunity like that when we have an easy way of getting in, by easy we meant hard worked way to get in. To which we said... Let's do it. We knew they opened the registration tent at 8, and knew people were going to camp or get in line pretty early (by early more like hardly sleep to stand in line). We planned to get there at 7, worse that can happen is that we see a huge line and turn around to start our 14 hr trek back to Texas. To our surprise, they opened early, one of our teammates who volunteered too texted us as 5 am telling us the line was huge and that they were letting people in. While we worried we were also ok with the thought of leaving it up to destiny, if it was for us we would get in without a problem if not we won't push it. Well... People if you ever try to get into ironman Arizona, get your speedpass. We got there at 7:20 am by 7:45 we were registered for it.

Volunteering is always an amazing experience, you meet so many amazing individuals that really inspire you to do what we do and also is gratifying to see how people just like us do these with their many purposes, either to prove themselves, get healthy, prove others, payback bets, celebrate life or just celebrate a birthday, seeing that finish line at midnight gives you goose bumps no matter which side of the fence you are on, spectator, athlete, Sherpa, volunteer, it's just an incredible amount of energy that we are excited and scared at the same time that we get to live again next year.

So there you have it, my name is Adriana, he is Felipe and we are Ironman Crazy. :)

Inspiration

Yup.. even the cupcake store makes IM cupcakes

Cheering is fun too

On Labor Day, we had a chance to go cheer on our friends M and G while they were doing their first sprint tri. Looking back a couple of months ago, we got them hooked shortly after we came back from our Ironman. M had mentioned that she had started running but we think they got to consider doing tris after talking more and more about it to us. We helped them go and check out bikes, talked them through the basics, helped them work on a training plan that was doable, and then they signed up for their first tri.

G coming into T2

G after a fast T2, getting on his 5K

Their first tri was the Blackland Sprint Tri. They were a bit nervous that week, asking the normal questions and we helped them plan the race, and help calm their nerves. They were ready and wanted to have fun. We had told them we were going to cheer them on during the race, so we planned to get there for the start, but a storm rolled in so it pushed us back a bit as we had to drive about 30 miles to get to Plano, TX. We had calculated their times and figured we would catch them coming into T2. We actually had a good place as we set up right at the dismount line. We got to see others before them come in and cheer everyone on. We saw G and M and then headed to catch them at the exit of T2. they looked great and seemed to be enjoying the race. We headed to chase them on the run. While we were waiting, we were able to see a few of our Instagram and Twitter friends and that was cool too, to get to cheer so many awesome people on our rest day :)

All smiles from M, it must have been a good ride :)

it wasn't too bad, she was still smiling 

Cheering made us think about our beginnings, also made us think of why we do this, which is one of the big reasons of this blog. We remembered how our first race was, our nerves, excitement and all the different emotions that go along with simply racing. Now, even though we have moved to longer distances and we have gotten more experienced, we haven't forgotten that we do this for other reasons. First and foremost it's to have fun, we push our bodies and want to do well, but we want to have fun. Although at times, pain comes with racing, the feeling of accomplishment at the end is amazing! We also do it because we want to become better individuals and better as a team. Team Res-Puli that is!  We've grown so much as individuals, not only physically through this process, but also mentally. We are tougher mentally, which makes us better on the personal and professional fronts. As a team, being a couple that tris has taught us so much, tri-ing as a couple, being married, pushing each other, building a stronger relationship, and having fun together. 

So while we had a lot of fun cheering and had a great time seeing M and G become part of the triathlete world and being proud of them, we also had a chance to look back and think about our tri life. We think that we'll be triing for a while, we love it, enjoy it and best of all... we still have FUN!!. 

  

That's it for now... our next post will be probably be after we take on Trifecta for the 2nd time. Should be a fun race.

One More On the Books... Repeating Rivercities

Last Sunday (August 4th) we had our latest race. It was a race that we signed up for before Ironman Texas so it was a race that even though we wanted to do to some extent turned out to be a bit of a drag. To start like we've been talking for the last few entries we haven't really found that motivation to get back into the groove of training with the same intensity we were before. Additionally, our work schedules have been crazy busy with traveling on both sides. To the point that for instance this time the one traveling pre-race was Res and going to Denver on an all week work training wasn't the most inducing environment to train and returning Friday to leave on Saturday morning to race on Sunday was a bit exhausting. To all that add a couple of weeks of above 100--degree weather in Texas and really makes things difficult. Yes we started using the "it's too hot" excuse. Oh well, we think we deserve it after training all winter for IMTX.

We don't really have any major races scheduled... Oh wait. Lets take that back, we don't have any long distance races scheduled. I guess an Olympic Tri (trifecta Tri), Bourbon Chase and Dallas Marathon sound so short after a 15:00 hr day. Needless to say we feel like our bodies still have some endurance left despite the few pounds we packed since May 18th. Maybe not.... We know that. 

We went to Rivercities Tri pretty much just wanting to do it just to do it. Maybe with the goal of not coming back with worse times than last year and maybe getting a PR, other than that the usual have fun and try to do our best. 

The day came, Saturday our drive east to Shreveport was easy. We convince K to do the drive so Puli was actually happy to not be the driver as normally happens. It's always fun to go to this race as the swag is pretty good. Better than most. For some reason it is one of the top 5 tris with the best swag. 

Had to take the same pic as last year :)

Our day started at the typical 5:00 alarm, get ready have a little breakfast. Packed the bikes and bags and headed to the lake. It is a beach start so it is always fun to have those. Puli was in the 3rd wave and Res was a couple of waves after. So off we went. The swim was pretty good for both of us, both of us lowered our times on it which was a good start. Our bike splits were good. Puli's was 0.1 mph faster than last year and he felt pretty strong the whole way to the point he was worried that he was going too fast and wanted to have legs left so he pushed back. Res' bike while not faster than last year was strong, consistent, and really the progress has been seen on it. Our run was when the wheels fell off. Puli was feeling good and started ok, but the heat took a toll on him and he couldn't get his HR down or stay cool. Res' run was great 2:00' PR over last years run which was amazing. Our transitions suffered a little as the racks were weird and the bikes were hard to get in and out. So in recap Puli didn't PR by less than a minute which he wil take and Res PR by over 2 minutes which she was excited about. 

Results...

In summary we decided that we definitely need to get back in the groove of things. Can't imagine if we had stuck to the training plan we have on our schedules which is focused on short races and building that speed that we need especially getting off the bike or on the swims. 

We also felt like we had lost respect of the distance to some extent. Our sprint or olympic nutrition/hydration is not as well thought out as our long distance ones. Is like we feel we don't need it. We needed it last weekend. We ran out of Infinit on the bike as it was so hot and humid. So starting the run with that in your mind that your are already digging up your reserves is not the greatest feeling.  

Throwback podium... last year's podium

We will do a short 5k in Belmar, NJ this weekend. The Belmar Chase, supposed to be pretty flat and fast we will see how the Jersey shore treats us. In the meantime we will definitely start our training discipline back on Monday when we get back home. We have a month to tweak a few things before Trifecta as we definitely want to PR this one. We have about 15 or so teammates doing it as well. 

Then after that we plan to take a triathlon hiatus and focus on our Bourbon Chase and Dallas Marathon to close out the year. We want to focus on the runs as it seems to be our weakest leg and also the one that we've lost the most on after IMTX. 

We'll hope to share the experience after Belmar's 5K. We want to keep the tradition of doing a race when we go to NJ, it might not be a podium like last years but we will keep the tradition alive. 

... maybe we are back...

So over the last few months we've been focusing on things other than triathlon... like life in general. It's funny, but even though we want to workout and our bodies actually feel ok during workouts it is just hard to go at it with the same intensity or regularity that we were before. Even funnier is to go to the group workouts and hear everyone (most of everyone, except the new team members) say that they haven't really worked out as they had planned.

On the personal non-tri front, I (Puli) am happy to announce that my Oregon stunts have probably come to an end. Yes, I'm back to the good ol' Texas. Even though I had a great experience working there both personally and professionally, nothing compares to being home and sleeping in your own bed with the ones you love next to you (that being Res and JayJay). On the workout front, well I think I'm going to miss a bit of it, working out there was pretty awesome, got to do awesome rides and runs. So I got to say... we are probably planning a riding vacation out there.

Last Mountain Bike Ride in Oregon

Climb to Mary's Peak, OR

On the personal tri front, a couple of weeks ago we did the Disco Olympic tri. Being our second Olympic and our first race after Ironman Texas, we really wanted to do it to come back to it. To try to get back to the swing of things. Traveling didn't allow for much swimming and motivation wasn't really there the whole time. So we did what we could, hitting about 50% of the training plan our Coach M graciously put for us, but not really killing ourselves to keep up with it. We weren't really afraid of the distance. Funny now how a 1500 m swim, 23 mi on the bike and a 10K on the run really doesn't even phase us and probably we need to take it more serious than that, but after having done 5 times that, we know our bodies have the distance, might not have the speed but we know we can finish it and not really puke or be completely exhausted by it.

Back to our Disco Tri, granted I had flown in on Friday for a Sunday race and had to leave again Monday so needless to say I was preoccupied, tired and really didn't feel like going out there to kill my self on the tri. Regardless I gave it my best, I think we all did.

The morning came, we had the Keller carpool ready (truck's name for race days, since we tend to fit 4-5 bikes and 4-5 people in it) and we headed up to the tri. About an hour's drive from home. So the wake up call came at 3:45 am (last time we did that was on Ironman day). We headed up there and it was overcast, and storms were rolling in. Got to the park after a minor incident getting into the park which I'm not going to bore you with, we got in parked and unloaded. Transition setup was again uneventful, with the exception of a lady who was just rude. I think she was a beginner and I was trying to help her but she was just rude (maybe she wasn't a morning person). We had designated racks (like many races) and she decided to come to my rack, when she was like 4 racks down actually by Res (her number was one number before Res) so I politely told her, she should not be racking there as they would probably make her re-rack and/or get a penalty. She fought me back and just went to the rack next to us, again racking way off from the place she had to. She even had a balloon for her bike, thought that was cute. Anyways.... I think in our sport we try to be nice for the most part and here is one of the reasons we share our experience, so other people getting started know or learn from our mistakes. So lesson here, listen to others, they are not trying to make your life harder, if they tell you something maybe is worth listening.

Res Looking Good 

My Signature... tongue out

The swim:
On the swim I knew I wanted to stay around 30 minutes, that meant to keep a
2:00'/100m pace. The swim start was a mass start with all male and female under 40. I started towards the back and found myself towards the middle by the first turn. I found a few feet that I followed but then ended up passing. Sighiting was a bit difficult because they only had the big buoys but other than that pretty easy swim. Garmin read 31:56 or 2:03'/100m, not bad.

Bad Ass team

The bike:
By the time I got to the bike the rain started, it wasn't too bad at first and I tried to push hard to see if I could cover more while the roads were dry, that didn't last long, about mile 1 or the entrance to the park the rain just was a constant drizzle and pretty much I settled for a pace to be safe and not screwed up crashing. I settled for a 20 mph pace which I tried to keep, some hills slowed me down but I didn't want to push too hard on them as I didn't really want to walk the 10K. I came out of the Oly detour and got with the Sprint people, I saw a couple of our teammates that I knew were ahead of me from the swim but they weren't too far ahead of me, maybe 1 mile or so, so I knew it wasn't too bad. Saw Res and a few others heading behind me and warned them to be careful on the turn as some folks had wiped out with the wet road. Anyways I started passing Sprint people and here was the other incident of the day. Note to people here.... please read the rules when you participate, mistakes can get you penalized and its not fun to spend time at the penalty box on big races (luckily I haven't and hope I won't). Anyways I wasn't going to let that bother me, just aggravated me a bit, but kept going.  Finished the bike, I wanted to have an hour (in perfect conditions) but with the rain I take the 1:08 I had, 20.2 mph average.

Run:

Res focussed on the finsh

Off to the run I went, I felt pretty good starting, it was a 2 loop run. First loop went ok, second loop I was starting to feel the lack of training, I was trying to keep an 8:30'/mile pace and not get my heart rate too high, but on the second loop I found my self slowing down between miles 3-5. I saw Res at mile 5 and she told me to go finish strong, I had started to pick up the pace then, I was doing about 8'/miles then and had a girl running behind me and we were just pushing off from each other. It was raining so I could hear her strides and she was keeping my same pace. When we came to the last 200 yds of the run she just sprinted to pass me, I gave it all I could to not let that happen and not let her chick me... yes I have some pride left :). It was funny because at the end she hugged me and thanked me for pushing her. It was more the other way around but I didn't say anything. Come to find out my 10K was 53:28 or an 8:40'/mi pace, come to find out later she was running a 7:40'/mi. which is what I kept for the last mile.

Worried about getting chicked....didn't happen!

All and all, the race was a good one, weather was great, could do without the rain but it turned out great. I think the rain actually helped us to stay cool and also to not push so much on the bike that we were able to run the 10K without that much of a problem. Definitely will do the race again next year so we can see how we do.
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Not a bad swag... Disco Tri-Top