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I didn't just stop after my first real triathlon. No, instead I became even more obsessed with it. I found it really, REALLY like this sport, it's very good for me and I want to stick with it. So, what do we need? A new challenge. Therefore... in 2002 I plan to do my first International (Olympic) distance triathlon!
Now, this is a bit harder than the relatively short races I did last year and so it requires more and above all better planned and coordinated training. I achieved my first big goal and learnt the basics. One of the important lessons I learnt was that my training was not consistent enough. I didn't really train smart. I just did a lot of running, swimming, cycling etc, lived healthy and had fun. But I also constantly ran out of time. I learnt a lot about how train more effectively, still have fun and -- with the same investment of time have a larger training effect. Essentially I started by having a real training plan -- now there is a concept.
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Also, I hooked up with other crazy people like me. I'm now a member of a local triathlon club, called TRIbe. Through Tribe I meet lots of other people to learn from. And there are events, like bike rides and - very important for me - there is a track workout with a coach every Tuesday. For the first time I get coached in my running, which is one of the things I sorely missed in my training last year. |
Through Tribe I also signed up already for my main races for this year (it's a big motivation when you have shelled out almost $100 in registration fee for a race you plan to do in a few months). Here are the three major races I'm training for. All three of them are Olympic distance triathlons:
Besides these main races I plan to do a number of shorter ones.
Nothing special has happened so far, but this is a good point to make a first report of my progress.
After the Salmon Duathlon (where my performance was quite pathetic) I took about about 1.5 months rest. I went swimming a few times a week, did a few light runs, but other than that I just took it easy and worked hard at work, got a lot of sleep etc. In early December I started training for real again. I made my first draft of the training plan which included strength training and lots of stretching and some gymnastics. One of the key components of the new training plan are exercises for improving core strength. I'm doing these exercises regularly for almost 2 months now and it has a tremendous effect. Since about 2 weeks I'm also signed up in a gym where I spend 2 sessions a week going through a strength program I worked out with a fitness councilor there. In just two weeks this routine has already shown effects on my swimming and bicycling performance (of course it is building on the 1.5 months of core strength training that came before).
I increased my swim distance per week quite significantly and since about a month or so I noticed that my swimming has become significantly more efficient. I'm not really surprised because it takes about a year of good training to achieve that effect. It's about a year I'm in the masters program. I now swim at least 3 times a week, sometimes 4 times and I've increased my minimum distance each time to 1500 yards. Typically I do about 2000. Today I swam a 1000 yard set (half breast stroke, half crawl) without any problems in 18:46. Not a bad time considering it was just a leisurely swim. Still I need a lot of extra work - I need to swim about 1500+ yards in the triathlons (and then still bike and run too).
Although I did only three track workouts with Tribe so far I see an effect there too. I videotaped myself running and my form is not sooo bad, but what I need to work on is cadence (number of steps a minute). This is my focus right now. Also there I see improvement already. I also increased my running distances and do at least one 10k run a week (the distance I'll run at the triathlon). My focus in running, as well as in swimming, is on efficiency.
Last thing: I'll buy a new bicycle. The old one is not a bad one, but I did notice that it started to limit me (and it IS heavy). Through Tribe I get a very nice discount on some bikes which will be very helpful there too.
OK, it has been a while since I wrote something but a lot has happened since. Aside from my vacation in Hawaii (see travel reports) I did get my new bicycle and I just finished my first 2 races.
The new bicycle is a real beauty. I got it a few days ago and due to bad weather, too much work and other obligations I haven't actually taken it out to the road yet. Here are a few photos (the photos link to larger versions of the images):
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Well, with this bike I expect to be significantly faster on the bike course, once I've gotten fully used to it.
My training took a bad hit while I was in Hawaii because I didn't swim much, run much and biked only a little. Also I was sick twice. But overall I did work a lot on my running technique in the past few months and it shows. On two time trials I ran I did 13:21 (for 3 km) and 22.20 (for 5k). Both are pretty darn close to the 7 minute/mile I try to finally achieve some time soon.
And then, this weekend, I had my first two races. Two races? you ask... Yes. It's a bit crazy, maybe, but I wanted to do both even when they are back to back. Below are the details. And to make this a bit more interesting, I put also a photo of the Tshirt design here, when the race has a shirt that I really like... (but then, there are few Tshirt designs I don't like ;) )
Saturday March 16, 2002
Almaden Valley Athletic Club Sprint Triathlon (AVAC Triathlon)
A very nice little race. A bit unusual because it's not only a pool swim, but also a stationary bike race. I didn't particularly like the bikes they have (nobody did) and the bike did turn out to trouble me a lot. It cost me over 3 minutes compared to riding the same distance on the stationary bike I have in the gym just 2 days earlier. The distances were: 400 yard swim, 5 miles bike, 2 miles run. It was a pretty cold and windy day. I was lucky as the weather got colder as the day went on. When the Elite folks races in the afternoon it was definitely not pleasant any more. I wasted about a minute in the transition from swim to bike and the bike cost me 3 minutes I estimate. Still I had a decent overall time of 38:27, which got me 3rd place in my age group (35-39 - 11 athletes in that group, just in case you wonder).
And here is the result and the Tshirt - ta taaa! A good start for this race season, that's for sure :)
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Also interesting about this race was that the Elite race was a bit 'different'. They did a 9 leg triathlon which shorter distances in the swim, bike and run, but had to swim, bike and run three times each. So you got to see a lot of transitions and a lot of confusion because the sequence got mixed along the lines swim, bike, run, bike, swim, run etc. Very interesting to watch, especially when it happens on stationary bikes. Definitely a spectator's race, although it must be quite an ordeal for the athletes :)
Sunday March 17, 2002
San Jose Mercury 10k
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Hmm.. does this name sound familiar? Right: that's the race where I ran my first ever 10k, just a year ago. It's hard to believe that a year ago I was wondering if I would ever be able to finish a single triathlon? My time then (see here) was 53.58, with a goal to stay under 55 minutes (to get into a seed spot for the Peachtree Road Race), remember? Well, this year I am a much better runner. I think I might have been able to finish it in about 45 minutes if I had pushed hard, but I didn't want to race too hard as I had that other race just the day before. Also it was super cold (about 45 deg F) and it rained through most of the race. These are absolutely not my favorite conditions. So my race goal was to stay under 50 minutes and I'm quite happy with my time of 47:23, which is a personal best time for a 10k, just by the way. It also means that I improved about a minute per mile in this past year. And I've really just started with serious run speed work this year, so I expect to see much more improvement. This year's race was the 25th annual S.J. Mercury 10k and they have a neat Tshirt hinting at this fact. Funny fact on the side: My race number was 53, and for the AVAC Tri my number was 52. Pure coincidence, of course :) |
What? No update for a full month? What's going on?
Well, a lot happened in the last month. I went to Austria for 10 days and -- a very long story -- I returned with bad back problems: the same back problems that I thought I had finally gotten rid of (I think I mentioned it on my 2000 triathlon page). Although the problem was minor this time, it really freaked me out because it had taken me over 2 years to (fully?) get rid of the problem the last time. I was very down these past few weeks, hardly did any exercise, didn't run at all and so forth. But there is a happy end, I think: I did continue light swimming and focused on gymnastics for my back issues. Over these two weeks I seem to have gotten it under control. This weekend I finally was able to go for a real run (a short one) and I did ride my bike three times this weekend (it's a great bike). Also these rides were still short -- I don't want to push it right now.
So essentially the situation is this: Since mide January my training was in a really sorry state and now I have to slowly build up again.And I don't want to do extra hard workouts because I have to be mindful of my back. The first Olympic distance race I signed up for is in about a month, on May 19. And there might be a business trip of a full week in these few weeks too... Will I be able to race? It's actually more than doubtful at this point. I might feel comfortable to enter and possibly finish the race, but I will not *race* but just take it easy. But we'll see what I'll feel like in a few weeks. There is still over a month. Ideally, I'd like to race a sprint tri before that thing - just in case. We'll see. Stay tuned and wish me luck...
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Well, I'm still alive, and let's just say a LOT has happened. Mostly good things. It's hard for me to believe that I wrote the previous update just a month ago -- the world looked so different then... Well, everything has changed and I'm in great shape. And if you checked the calendar... tomorrow is the big day: South Bay triathlon in Morgan Hill, and boy am I ready!! I had a few excellent training rides lately (the bike is just a dream), and my running didn't come along too bad either, even though I'm not as fast as I was last year. I finally bought a wetsuit and I plan to put it to good use tomorrow. Actually, the wetsuit won't be necessary tomorrow (UVAS reservoir is surprisingly warm right now), but it will make me faster and it will make the entire swim a lot easier. Also, I'll race under TRIbe colors for the first time! Here is a photo of the TRIbe uniform (sorry for the grumpy, sleepy look, but this photo was taken very early one morning while I was working my butt off for a project). Sooo... stay tuned for tomorrow's update. It's so good to be back! :) |
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YES! I did it, and it was an excellent race! At first it looked like the weather wouldn't cooperate (it did start raining 2 hours after the race) but it was not as cold as I had feared. A little cool, maybe, but well within my comfort zone. This was the longest race I've tried to do so far: 1200meter (3/4 mile) swim, 16miles bike, and 5 miles run. My time was 1:53:20, which is a good time for me. I did the swim in 22:42, the bike in 47:23 and the run in 38:15. My transition times were not quite as good (especially T1 was slow as I was getting dizzy coming out of the swim). There was a great party afterwards, with good food and lots of nice people around. I thorougly enjoyed the entire event. The new wetsuit also worked very well for me (who knows how slow that swim would have been without that suit...). Below are a few photos, most of them courtesy of Winn who came to the race to cheer me on! :) The photos of the lake are by me, taken 2 weeks earlier in much nicer weather. |
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Andreas staring down the swim course... |
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Now this was not quite an Olympic distance triathlon yet... Stay tuned for next month's update when I'll try to tackle the San Jose International Triathlon -- a full Olympic Distance Triathlon!
A somewhat somber update, this time... After UVAS I took it pretty easy for a week to recover. Then came Memorial Day weekend and I started training again, but also went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. During this weekend something happened - I'm still not sure what, but I came down with a really nasty stomach virus. Just imaging being in bed for almost a week, not eating any solid food for 5 days and stuff like that. We all know the symptoms. Let's just say that I lost 6 pounds just on the first day (mostly fluids of course, but still). After the week I was a wreck and I felt like I would never get back in shape for the SJIT (San Jose International Triathlon).
It really didn't look too good, indeed. The first week after I was 'OK' again, I had a hard time swimming as much as 400 meters or to bike more than a few miles. But then, about 2 weeks after I got sick, my body started to slowly recover, and it recovered surprisingly quickly from that point on. Today I still weigh about 5 pounds less than I weighed on Memorial day. Interestingly, although I do eat plenty, my body doesn't seem inclined to gain any weight beyond the 156 pounds I have now (which is about 4 pounds below the lower limit for ideal weight for my age and size. I guess my body doesn't agree with that statistic). It doesn' seem to hurt me, performance-wise, so I have no complaint there.
Fortunately, I don't have to go into the SJIT without a test:
The Tri For Fun series is a series of Sprint triathlons designed for beginners. They have three identical races, one month apart and then a slightly longer sprint in September, the Tri For Real (I did that one last year -- see the 2001 update). The Tri For Funs are not competitive and there is no ranking and time keeping. The Tri For Real is timed and competitive. Just because I do Olympic distance races now doesn't mean I cannot enjoy shorter races too.
As I noticed at UVAS, my transition times suck big time, so a series of short races is ideal to practice transitions. So I signed up for the whole series (4 races). I think the have the same Tshirt design for all three Tri For Funs, only that they give you a long sleeve at the first one, a short sleeve at the second and a tank top and the third one
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Today I did the Tri For Fun #1, and I did it surprisingly well and I had a lot of fun. As I am training for longer races, I can enjoy a shorter one so much more as it's a bit easier. The distances are: 400 yard swim (I think they measured that short though because I have no other explanation of my swim time), a 13 mile bike ride (also measured a bit short, I think) and a 3.1 mile run (5k). My overall time was just under an hour: 59:41 :) Swim: 5:02 The reason for the inexact splits is that I dropped my HRM and it did a master reset and I lost that data. This is what I remember. Soooo, that means I'm actually in a half-way decent shape. That gives me a lot more confidence for next week -- and I need that because the distances will be about 4 times that for the swim and double for bike and run. Stay tuned and wish me luck :) |
This is it. THE race I've been training for for 2 years!! If you check my first triathlon update page you'll see that this race is what got me started in Triathlon. That very day, 2 years ago I was rudely woken up by yelling and general noise outside my window. When I went to check what the hell was going on, I discovered Triathlon and was hooked. As you can infer from this description, the SJIT is also -- sort of -- my house race, because it happens literally across the street from my apartment. I know every stone and pothole on that bike and run course.
Now you can imagine just how depressed I was when that stomach virus took so much out of me that I was not sure I would get in shape for that race again. I still won't be quite as fit and fast as I could have been without a 2+ week hole in my training. And I was in SUCH great shape after UVAS *sob*. Well, we will see how well I recovered. Stay tuned!
There it is. The race I've trained for all those past 2 years. Really! If you go back to the start of my triathlon updates, you'll find out that this is where it all started -- the SJIT in 2000. Now it's 2002 and I'm competing there myself. And HOW I'm competing too! Let's just say I had a spectacular race (see below), especially when you considered that I was quite sick just recently and was not at all sure I could do that race at all.
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The SJIT is pretty much a full Olympic Distance Triathlon, except that the swim is a bit short: 1.25 km swim, 40 km bike, 10 km run. It's a blazing fast course as it's mostly flat both on the bike as well as on the run. My swim was not stellar as I decided to take it easy there. The visibility in Lake Almaden is non-existant so there were a lot of navigation problems (people swimming right into me etc.) I decided to swim a slighly longer, and less crowded course. This cost time of course so I was about 1.5 minutes slower than I expected on the swim. The transition went quite well. The large time for T1 comes from the fact that you have to run about 1 minute to get to the transition area, and about another 30+ seconds to get out of the area. The bike was very fast (personal record) and I felt great after it -- only my butt was really sore, which I noticed right when I started the run. The run itself was pretty good too. I took it fairly easy there and even put in 3 short walk breaks (I'm a fan of walk breaks). Despite this I made a personal record on the run! Here is the kicker: with me being sick I more or less settled on the goal to come in in under 3 hours. Well, my time was 2:25:41 which is nothing short of spectacular given those expectations. Here is the breakdown:
It sure will he hard to top this one at the next race... |
Here is what triathletes consider 'fun': let's go to an "everybody welcome" track meet and register for a handful events and treat it as a speed workout. Well, that's what happened this Thursday in Los Gatos. Actually it turned out to be a lot of fun. I decided to do the 800m, 400m, 200m, 1 mile and 2 mile, but then the event took so long that I skipped the 200m and the 2 mile one. The whole thing was slightly chaotic, as I had never been at a track meet before and no idea how things worked. I just did about 500 m easy jogging to start my warmup and I ask a guy who looked like he knew what was going on: "where do I sign up for the 800m?" He says: "just stand behind that while line, son"... 10 seconds later the gun went off. Yikes! Well, I hit the track full speed and do the first loop in an really good time for me (69 seconds). Meters into the second loop my legs suddenly feel like putty. I have to slow down. What was I thinking? I am a long distance runner, not a sprinter! I finished the 800m in 2:45, so you can figure out just how slow I was on that second loop.
The fun thing was though, not too much later I was ready again for the 400m. Now I knew I can go full blast for one loop, and I did (70 seconds). And a while later I did the 1 mile run too in 6:26, which is not such a bad time. Sooo, it was fun, I think. I might spend more time on the track again, I guess...
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But something else happened on that Thursday... as I may have mentioned somewhere, I'm fawning over a set of aero wheels for my bike. Only I cannot really afford them at this point. Well, another TRIbe member was selling a set of pretty good aero wheels... an older model, slightly used but at a very reasonable price. And those are good wheels -- they may not be the totally cool and hip tri-spoke wheels I would like to have, but they will help a lot in the time till I can maybe upgrade to those. He brought the wheels to the track meet and after I inspected them for a while and pondered the sorry state of my bank account, I decided to get them. Now, doesn't that bike even look faster already? We'll see at the next few races how much of a difference they will make (on a typical 40k time trial, such weels should make a difference of 2+ minutes (and that considers that I had pretty decent wheels to start with).
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Well, it had to happen at some point. I had a really really bad day. This is my first DNF (Did Not Finish) ever. I had a bad feeling about the day already, but I chose to ignore it. Well, here is what happened (at least the highlights). It started the evening before when my front tire blew without any obvious cause. So I fixed that. The next day everything indicated it might be a good day for a training race etc. But during the swim warmup, somebody swam right into me and boxed me so hard right in the face that I felt dizzy for several minutes. Not a good start (my nose still hurts). The swim was pretty good anyway (5:50 if I remember correctly) and also the transition worked well. But then, about 4 miles out, my back tire blew. So I stopped and changed the tube. I was about done with that, and started to mount the wheel again and the tire blew again! But I had only one spare tube on me (it was a short race after all). So I decided to call it a day. A race volunteer mis-informed me that there was no car picking up people, and they didn't have a radio on them either, so I shouldered my bike and walked the 4 miles back -- barefoot (cannot walk for cleats). That caused a bloody blister on the left and a painful regular blister on the right foot. And so on and so on. Clearly not a good day. But the weather was beautiful. I almost enjoyed the walk and I got some perverse pleasure out of walking the race course the wrong way round with a bike on my shoulders, cheering on every cyclist that came by... :) Hey - I still got a tank top out of the thing (see left). Otherwise I learned one important lesson: don't buy ultra-light race tubes when they are having a sale. My guess is that those tubes were old or simply low quality... |
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To make up for the bad day I had yesterday I had an absolutely wonderful race today! 1.2 miles open water swim is a long distance for me (and the course was measured a bit long -- it was probably 1.3 miles). I swam with the wetsuit, although the water was very warm (about 78 deg F). I finished in a time that I cannot call anything but spectacular. I had swum this distance in the pool in 43 minutes a few days earlier. I finished in 34:33!! If they had done an age-group split up in the wetsuit division, that would have been 2nd place in the Male 35-39 group! Overall I came in 29th in the wetsuit division (18th male) out of 120-ish total. The "skins" (no wetsuit) division was much larger. That same time would have gotten me about 55th place there and 4th place in my age group. Of course, without wetsuit, it would have also taken me a bit longer so you cannot really compare those times. I'm very happy with this result! And I'm particularly happy with the fact that the swim was just a totally enjoyable event. I didn't even feel tired afterwards! |
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After my bad luck at the Tri For Fun I got very careful with my wheels. I kicked out all the cheap tubes, put new rim tape on my wheels and checked my bike again and again. I didn't want anything to happen -- especially not at Folsom, which is the longest race I'm doing this year. It also involves a lengthy drive + a hotel stay. Therefore. another DNF would mean not only a bad race, but also a lot of money and time down the drain. All went OK. But there were other issues which made this a pretty tough race: First of all, it was unpleasantly hot. At 5am, when I drove from the hotel to the race it had about 75 deg F already! I estimate that the temperature was in the low 90s by the end of the run. The water, on the other hand, was pretty cold. I had measured about 65 the evening before the race, but there is a cold current through that lake which is much colder -- possible as low as 55 deg. Brrr. I was very glad to have my wetsuit. Besides all of that, the race was not at all "flat" as they had said, but had rolling hills on the bike + pretty strong headwinds on some stretches. And on the run we had a few pretty un-flat pieces as well (up to 7% incline). Distance:1500m swim, 40km bike, 10 km run. T1 was difficult because it involved running up muddy and slippery wooden stairs from the lake. My overall time was about 10 minutes slower than at the SJIT. A few minutes of that were caused by the 250 meters longer swim. The rest came from me literally burning up on the run. I had to walk a distance because my kneed felt pretty bad after the hilly bike ride and because I felt generally weak However, my bike time was almost like SJIT (which is great if you consider that SJIT is much flatter and had no wind).
I came in about in the middle of my age group. Not a great placement, but not bad considering the problems I had on the run :) Folsom has a neat little historic center, by the way. Aside from the very pretty lake, a major attraction is the powerhouse, which at one time generated electricity for the state capitol in Sacramento.
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Less than a week after Folsom, I was not exactly in top shape (still recovering and nursing a hurting foot), but I had a good race anyway. It's "for fun" after all, so I didn't try to kill myself, but just to enjoy the race.
It would have been nice to break one hour... well, maybe next time :) After the race I had finally time to explore Pleasanton a bit and I'm very glad I did. This place must be the most livable city I've seen in California so far. A real city center with lots of nice, little stores. But not just the typical tourist trap 'antique' stores, but also real stores you expect to see in a city that is alive, cafes, restaurants, book stores etc. Very nice. And their own triathlon series right in town. What more can you ask for? |
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The final event in the Tri 4 Fun series happened this Sunday. I hadn't trained all too much lately, partly because of work overload, partly because I hurt my foot a bit at Folsom. So I was not sure how it would turn out. Well, the rest hasn't hurt me and I had a great race. This was the first triathlon whereI repeated a race from the previous year so this is the first reality check for me whether I improved since last year. And, yes, I did improve: I was about 10 minutes faster than last year! Of course a large part of this is the better bike, but I'm still happy. I set for myself goals for what times I would like to achieve in each leg and I achieved all those goals. A finish time under 1:30 would have been great, but I think that would have been pushing it, so that was not one of my goals. The distances are 700 yd swim, 22 mile bike, 4 mile run. However, I think the bike course is shorter. My cycling computer measured only 16.5 miles for the bike leg.
I'm especially happy with the improvement in the transition times, because that just shows that I have practiced that part a lot. There is still room for improvement, though. According to the results posted at the race I placed 51st overall (out of around 600 finishers) and 29th in the 30-39 age group (out of about 180). Not bad. |
What's next? Well, the race season is coming to a close. I decided I'd like to do one more triathlon this year -- an Olympic distance race at Bethel Island in 2 weeks. A fast, flat course. That will be fun. If I feel like it I might do an open water swim at the same location the next day.
Well, I did not make it to the Bethel Island Triathlon, after all, which is really too bad, because I was in very good shape and it probably would have been a really good and fun race. The reason was that just a week before that race I suddenly got back problems on a long bike ride. The back problems were gone by the end of the week, but I felt it was better to not test my luck and skip that race. Therefore, the Tri for Real was the last triathlon for this year after all.
But there are still two more things coming up: The Muddy Buddy, is a team fun race (mountain biking + running) on 10/20 and I'm registered for that one with a work colleague. Also I still plan to run my first half-marathon at the Silicon Valley Marathon on 10/27 (that will be a relay with another work colleague). After that I'd love to do the Salmon Duathlon again on 11/2, but I doubt I'll be in the mood to run that race so soon after the half-marathon. Also, I will probably be moving that weekend...
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Wohooo - another update. The last month was full of stress and health issues so I'm very happy I can report something positive (aside from the fact that I finally found a new apartment and that I'll move in less then 2 weeks) Today the MuddyBuddy San Francisco took place here in San Jose (go figure that one out). The location was very convenient -- across the street from my apartment in Almaden Park. MuddyBuddy is a team race and I did it with Clemens, a colleague from work. It involves 2 racers and one mountain bike. The two racers switch between running and biking and conquer obstactles on the way, such as a haybale pyramid, the tire obstacle, crawling under a net and the mud pit. Loads of fun. Due to a misunderstanding at the mudpit (we waited for each other on opposite sites of the obstacle and lost 2-3 minutes this way) we came in 53rd in about 55 minutes. This is still a good time, but if we hadn't lost that time we would have been ranked significantly better. It's a great, fun race. Try it! Go to their web site and see some of the photos to get an idea what it's like :) And check out this great photo of me emerging from the mud pit!! Then see this one to get an idea of what my clothing looked like before the mud pit :) Next week: Silicon Valley Marathon. I'll do the half-marathon relay with Chris. I've run 12 miles with in about 1:40 last Thursday, without going for speed and without any problems, so I think I should be good for the 13.1 miles as well. As this is my first race over such a distance I won't set a time goal. It would be nice to finish it in less than 2 hours, though. And everything close to 1:45 would be even better (but unlikely). |
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It was coooold in the morning and I was glad I was running the second part of that race. Chris did great and simply ignored the cold weather. He arrived in Los Gatos after 1:58 approx and I took over. Ha ha -who said "flat course"! There were at least 2 very noticeable hills on my part and it seems there were also 2-3 on Chris' part. Maybe not really hills in the strict sense of the word, but for a first timer on such a long distance they were very noticeable. But I did fine. I did my traditional walk breaks of one minute every 10 minutes and reached the finish line in 1:48. Good time, I think! I'm very happy with that result! So this was supposedly the last race for the season. I had decided not to do the Duathlon the week after this one because it would just be too much. My body needs some rest some time. Other news (plenty of it) At this race I used my new heart rate monitor for the first time. It continuously records my heart rate and then I can see the data as a curve on my computer. A wonderfully geeky toy! I love it! A few days after this race I moved to a new apartment - in Los Gatos. Close to the L.G. creek trail, Vasona park etc. etc. All great places for training, running, ... Also on this Sunday I had my first class of a Bikram yoga boot camp for runners and cyclist. Very interesting. It's exhausting (because it's done in a well heated room) but I like warm better than cold anyway. Yoga feels really good for me. I should have started that earlier. Now this will be part of my recovery training over the next few months... |
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Did I say anything about 'last race of the year" or so? Well, of course I couldn't just do that, right? Seriously, I had planned to take a month off, at least. But then I heard about this race... and when do you have a chance to run the Golden Gate Bridge both ways!? I felt pretty good 2 weeks after the half-marathon, so I decided to do it... but I made that decision very short term and only because I was in the city to meet friends anyway. And I took it easy. Well, sort of... Just for kicks I left out most of the walk breaks for the first time (did I say "take it easy"?). I did only one full walk break. The weather was cooold and we barely escaped rain. It was windy too (especially on that bridge!) And there was one really bad hill. But I did an excellent time. I came in in 1:19:53, which is a clean 8 min/mile ! I'm very happy with that result. But now I really mean it! Season is over! Period. To be continued next season :) |
