chasing Arnold day 3

Friday was my first day back to training after having surgery on October 12th. I ran a little over three miles. Considering how little I've trained this year I felt pretty good.

Saturday was a triathlon rest/recovery day for my kids soccer and some time for my wife and I.

This morning I rode my bike for the first time in a VERY long time. I started a little before 7 AM when there was enough ambient light to ride safely. After only a few miles a large truck passed me pulling a horse trailer and I immediately came back home and finished the rest of my workout on my indoor trainer. A little over a year ago I got ran over by a vehicle while cycling, since then I've struggled to ride outdoors near traffic.

I've lost most of my cycling fitness in the last year, so my indoor cycling workout was terrible. My rpms kept slipping below 85 and when I tried to increase my cadence above 85 per minute my heart rate would sky rocket into zone 3. I wrapped up my workout after an hour so that I could get the kids up and ready for church. In that hour of riding the rollers my average pace was less than 12 mph. I have a LONG ways to go until I'm able to accomplish one of my personal goals of beating Arnold Ceniceros, the champion (multiple years) of the Clydesdale open division in South West Challenge series. At the Eagle in the sun triathlon in El Paso Texas in September Arnold Ceniceros swam 400 meters in 8:06, biked 12 miles keeping a whopping 20.2 mile an hour pace, and ran 5 kilometers keeping an average pace of 9:36, he finished in 1 hour 16 mintues. My average race swim and running times are comparable to his, but I've only had a few races in my life that I was that fast on the bike, and I'm no where near average right now. If I'm going to try competing against ol' speedy Ceniceros I have to get MUCH MUCH faster. There's a LONG road of training ahead of me.

The 2012 Warrior triathlon race report

On Sunday October 7th I competed in The Warrior triathlon, it was my 1st off road triathlon, and my 82nd multisport race. This year the Warrior triathlon was held at the Albuquerque Academy. It was a 5k run, 12k bike, and 400 yard swim. The run and bike utilized the dirt and sand trails inside the Alb Academy. There were plenty of help, over 60 volunteers. The course was a ton of fun, it was well marked and had multiple volunteers at every twist and turn so we never had to worry about getting lost or turned around.

The run was mostly hard packed dirt with a few sandy sections. It was uphill and challenging on the 1st half, down hill and blazing fast on the 2nd half. My run time was a slow and grueling 29:19.

The bike course had some flat hard packed dirt sections, some asphalt, some sandy technical sections, and even a couple ravines that we had to dismount and run our bikes through. I was nervous about the bike, this only the 3rd time I'd ridden a mountain bike off of the black top, so i knew I was out of my realm. Considering my total lack of experience riding a mountain bike and on trails I was content with my performance. My bike time was 41:47.

The swim course vastly different than any pool swim I'd ever done. It was held indoors and utilized two two hundred yard pools. The 1st 200 yards was in a salt water pool, then we exited the 1st pool and ran to a 2nd pool that was a normal pool. I'd never swam in a salt water pool, that was awesome. Having to get out of one pool half way through the swim and run to another to finish the last half of the swim reminded me of Ironman Florida's swim. I felt the split swim with a salt water pool was great fun and made for a perfect end to a fantstic and unique triathlon. Over all this was the most fun I'd ever had at a triathlon. My swim time was 8:16.

I take my hat off to Mark Mico, the race director of the Warrior triathlon.

My total race time was 1:19:20, I finished 7th out of ten in the 35-39 age group and 62nd out of 220 overall.

Just before the start of the race my front tire went flat. Turns out I'd forgot my tire irons at home. Thankfully a guy by the name of Brian Gutierrez jumped in and lent me his. While changing my tire I broke one of his tire irons, but he was ok with it. I was grateful for his willingness to help out. If anyone knows this guy, tell him I said thank you.

Day 1

Today I rode my bike. This was the 1st time in months that I got time in the saddle so this felt like a huge accomplishment! I seem to have found some motivation to start training again. That motivation is a late season race. I'll let you know what that race is if I'm able to continue training consistently.

I weighed in at 234 pounds this morning. My goal is to be back to 197 by my first triathlon in the spring.

I'm no fair weather rider

Today a snow storm hit Santa Fe. It lasted a few hours. One of the things I love about New Mexico is that I can ride my bicycle pretty much year round. As long as the snow isn't sticking to the roads or there isn't ice on the roads I can still ride.

Let me back track just a bit. For the last 3 weeks I've been on paternity leave & haven't shaved so I have grown one heck of a beard.

So, on with the story. Today I saw that there was an inch or so of snow sticking to the ground, but none at all sticking to the roads, so I threw on my cold weather cycling gear & took off for a ride! After about 20 minutes of riding the people who drove by were pointing at me. I get that a lot when I ride during the winter. Last year I went on a 3.5 hr bike ride in 19 degree weather. I actually had someone who drove past me turn back around & record me on their camcorder as I rode past them:) This time it was a while before I figured out why people were so amused with me. The snow that would normally hit my clean shaved face would melt. Today the snow was hitting my beard & instead of melting it was freezing & building up. After 45 minutes I had over a half inch of snow frozen onto my bearded face. Here's an interesting fact- the snow freezing onto my beard prevented the cold wind from hitting my face. So my face was warm & comfortable the entire ride.

Good deed and the Tour

Today I celebrated the 4th of July with a 3 hr 20 minute brick workout with my best friend. We started at the Smiths @ Tramway & Central. We rode up into the mountains & after a 30 minute warm up we did 5X12 minutes in zone 3 with 3 minute rest intervals. We turned around 3 miles from Chilile. We ended up finishing 42.6 miles on the bike then completed off with a 20 minute run.

On the tail end of the ride I decided to ride past Smiths to get an extra 15 minutes of riding in. I didn't need to do this, but I made a last minute decision. 15 minutes past Smiths we turned our bikes around & we attempted to head back to our vehicles, but before we could we heard someone yelling in a near panicked voice "hey! Hey you on the bike! Help!"

I stopped my bike & looked around. I could still hear the voice yelling for me to help, but I couldn't see anyone. I approached some bushes on the side of a house & lying there on the ground was a little old lady who had fallen & was unable to get up on her own. When I reached down to help her up I realized just how old she was. Very elderly & frail. Apparently she'd been there awhile because her face was red & flushed from the heat & she had defecated herself. I told her I was going to call 911, but she got really mad & told me no! She gave me a number she wanted to call. Apparently it was the house we were outside of. After I told the person who answered what the situation was a 20 something year old kid came out of the house to help her in. I was pissed off because he left her there outside so long. He never checked on her or heard her yells. He should of been more aware.

The good deed having been done, we headed back to our vehicles to finish off the 3 hr bike ride with a quick 20 minute run.

Once we finished our days workout I headed to my in-laws house to catch the last 46 minutes of the Tour De France. I heard on Verses that Lance Armstrong is lighter at the beginning of this Tour than any of the 7 he had been victorious in. Sounds like a great start!!!

I wasn't sure- I don't think anyone outside of team Astana is sure who will be their team leader this year. At the end of the day Alberto Cantador took 2nd place, Andreas Kloden took 4th, Levi Leipheimer took 6th & Lance Armstrong took 10th place. I don't know if that means Lance will be a domastique for Contador or the other way around, but I know that if 4 of the top 10 riders of stage 1 are team Astana, that boads well for them. Either way I'll be watching EVERY day, each & every minute of the Tour this year to find out.

God bless.