I'm back

Yes, that's right, I'm back. And so much has changed. During the last year, I've been focusing on reorganizing my life. Since my last post I've moved, gotten a divorce and refocused my fitness goals. Today I am living my new normal and loving every minute. I never stopped working out, I just stopped writing about it. With my divorce and subsequent move, I stopped all endurance training and focused on weight training. Today I am stronger and have so much more confidence, but cardiovascularly, I have some work to do to get back to where I was a year ago. But that's why I'm here. Yesterday I went for a run. Outside. It was cold and the trail was full of ice and slush. I managed about 2.25 miles. I felt good, but stopped because I got frustrated by my wet sneakers and slippery ice. In hindsight, I'm glad I stopped when I did because, let's be honest, I don't want to kill myself on my first run in months.

So that's it for now.

If you were sitting up at night wondering what I've been up to during 2013, you can see the highlights from my Tumblr.

New year, new training goals

At the end of September, I made some grand plans for 2013. I stated them loud and proud. Now, a mere three days into 2013, I’m not a shamed at all to say I was full of it.

As it turns out, I cannot dive head first into a year of training while moving (this Saturday!) into a new house, getting a divorce, sorting out custody arraignments and working two and a half jobs. 

Since so much has happened since I last posted, I’ll spare you all the minor details and give you the bullet points.

Austin Marathon

I’m still headed to Austin and I plan to run, just not the full marathon. I just don’t  have the time, mental capacity, drive or desire to train properly for the full marathon, so I will run the half. I had been tossing around the idea of only running the half for a few weeks when I started out on a planned 16 mile run. I didn't feel good about this run from the start and at about mile 10, my body said stop. My hip started bothering me and I realized I just couldn't put myself through another long injury recovery period. Clearly I wasn't treating my body well enough to put it through the rigors of a full marathon. Maybe next year.

Triathlons

The thing about getting a divorce and moving on with your life is that you realize pretty quickly how little time and money you have when half your support system is gone. My free time will now be spent with my children. I have been spending time in the gym working on my strength, but my endurance has suffered since I haven't been logging many miles running, swimming or biking. I just don’t have the time to devote to the hours needed for these endeavors right now. Maybe I’ll change my mind in a few months after life settles down. The desire to race is there, the funds and time just aren't. I promised a friend I’d do a race with her this year, I will keep my promise but my focus will be on fun… not competition.     

Life is good

While so much negative stuff is going on, there is a sparkle of hope and happiness I'm holding on to. Divorce is never easy, no matter how hard you try. There is no easy way out; there is no way to get through it without hurt feelings... but there is hope. I have found  happiness reuniting with friends I haven't spent much time with; I've found that I have the drive to work hard to get the things I need. I've found confidence and I found friends who promise to be there - and actually are there - when needed. Most of all, I've found that my children are strong, resilient and see the silver lining in almost any situation. I am proud of them. I want them to see me as a strong, independent, determined woman who will do anything for them. I want to show them how to live healthy, how physical work equals physical strength. I want to give them peace and security and I want them to be happy, without compromising my own happiness. For me personally, 2012 was a very hard year on all levels. I cried at the stroke of midnight, said good-bye to 2012 and opened the door to 2013. A brand new year with brand new opportunities.  

(btw, if you live in the Montgomery County, Pa, area and want to schedule a free trial MaxOut workout with me, comment below or simply visit the site and request a free trial. Also, if you're interested in any of the hundreds of AMAZING Herbalife products, including the new Herbalife 24 made for and by athletes, visit my website and place an order or comment below and I'll get in touch with you)

What if? Organizing marathon fears

As we embark on the second week of training, I'm struck by fear. Here are my biggest fears about this marathon:

Injury
I'm scared out of my mind about re-injuring my hip. It's not like I can stop running and focus on my swim and bike while my hip heals. I cannot, absolutely cannot, inflame my hip. It CANNOT happen. To combat this problem, I'll be doing a strength workout once a week. This, combined with the change in my run gait I worked on this past season, should stave off any injury. If it doesn't work, I might cry.

Asthma
The timing of this race is a little nerve-wracking for me. The race is Feb. 17. In Pennsylvania, February tends to be very cold. In Austin, it'll be beautiful. However, all of my training will be done here, not Austin. Once it gets cold, I'll only be able to run in the the bitter cold for so long. After about the 35 degree mark, I have to move inside because my lungs cannot handle the cold. Dry, cold air literally closes my lungs and I cannot breathe. I'm pretty sure I'll be doing a majority of my long runs on the treadmill; the thought of which makes me cringe.

Paging Dr. Ross... Regarding the above two concerns, I will be coming to the Performance Lab again very soon.

Weather
What if it snows? OK, so I know this fear is a stretch, but I have a plane to catch. If the weather is bad, will I even be able to get to Austin? Will I have trained so long, spent hundreds of dollars on airfare and race registration for nothing? I will not know the answer to this until the day my plan is set to fly.

Time management
When the going gets tough, workouts tend to fall by the wayside. Let's be honest, I have a lot of things going on right now. Between a full- and part-time job, the kids and my new relationship status, things are getting a little hectic. I think I'll manage to do all my running workouts, but will my swim and bike may suffer? If they do, what does that mean for next year's triathlon season?

Confidence
What if I can't run 26.2 miles? I'm not even talking injury.. what if I just cannot run 26.2 miles? That's some serious distance. I can tell you that during the last 5k of any half marathon I've ever run I thought my legs would fall off... what happens when I double that distance? First off, I train for it, that I know. It just seems so huge to me right now.

Phew... Now that all my concerns on in front of me in black and white, I feel a little better. Organizing fear, anyone else find comfort in it?

Triathlon is a part-time job I need time to do

Here's the thing, I LOVE that I have a coach to get me through my training, but I hate not knowing the future. When I would get weekly workouts from Joanna while training for Eagleman, they were so packed with goodies that I only focused on getting through each week. Now that it has only running on it, the schedule looks weak. I can only guess that's going to change, but I don't know for sure since I cannot predict what torture training Joanna has in store for me in the following weeks.

This week my schedule includes speed work, an easy run, a tempo run and a long run. Mixed in are a few gentle reminders to get my ass on the bike and swim, which I have woefully neglected. But I have an excuse. A good one: There are only so many hours in the day and I can only be so many places at once.


How did I ever manage to train for three sports? I better figure it out ... and fast.

Triathlon training goals for 2013

My life kinda fell into shambles after Eagleman in June, hence my lack of posts and my lack of miles. My husband and I decided just two weeks before Eagleman that we were going to separate. Not a huge shocker to me, but a life-changing event nonetheless. Two months later I raced Steelman, which I did on Joanna's encouraging so I'd have something to focus on to keep me motivated. I raced, I had a great time, but I really felt pretty down when all was said and done.

But, during this time of flux, I've been reevaluating who I am, who I want to be and what I want out of life. What I've determined is that I'm not going to let a change in my relationships status determine the outcome of my life. So I began plotting out my race schedule.

Every good triathlete has a night of drinking with an equally crazy friend to determine their race schedule for the following year, right? No? Well, that's what I do. Don't judge. Anyway, we started researching Ironman race courses. We wanted a flatter course, but not pancake flat, but shouldn't be major hills, like Lake Placid. We found Ironman Cozumel, and fell in love. But the realist in me knows that with my life influx, maybe an Ironman in 2013 isn't a great idea. However, if I make 2013 a building year, and Ironman in 2014 is a certainty.

Here are my goals:
First, I'm going to run a marathon. Probably a good idea if I'm considering an Ironman, right? This was another decision made during a night of drinking, but this time it was with my cousin, who was up this way from Austin.

She said, "I think you should run the Austin Marathon. It's in February and it's a great time to be in Austin. Plus our condo is 2 miles from the start, right along the race course." While sitting at the bar, I sent a quick email to Joanna asking her if she thought I could be ready for a marathon by February. She said, and I'm paraphrasing, if we start soon, I think you'll be ready.

A few days later, I registered, booked airfare and committed my brain to a marathon. Beginning Oct. 1, Joanna will be helping me train for my very first marathon.

Heaven help me.

Next on the list are a few Olympic distance races for 2013. I'd like to do Red Bank again. It was a beautiful course and I'd like to redeem myself from my terrible showing on the bike. I also want to do Steelman again because it was so much fun. My crazy triathlon friend suggested the Bethany Beach Triathlon, that I'm considering that as well as New Jersey State Triathlon.

As far as another half distance next year... I haven't decided yet. I think it might be a good idea to do one, but I don't know which to do. Eagleman was too hot and really early in the season. Diamondman was fun, but I'm not sure I want to repeat that again. So, I'm open for suggestions. I'm thinking Pocono 70.3, but I'm not 100% sold on it yet.

VIDEO: 7 tips for bicycle safety

A few weeks ago, I got up at the crack of dawn for work to help put together a video on bike safety with the help of some of my fellow coworkers. This is basic bicycle safety, but extremely informative for drivers as well as cyclists.

Here is the video. It's totally ok if you laugh at my expense.

Steelman Olympic distance race report

The sun coming up over Lake Nockamixon.

Knock-knock. Anyone there? Yes, I have been MIA for the last two months because, I will be totally honest, I have a lot going on in my life right now. Most of it I can't write about, which absolutely effects the stuff I can write about and makes the stuff I can write about far less interesting. At least to me. BUT through it all, I managed to get in one final triathlon this season: Steelman at Nockamixon State Park in Quakertown.

Let me start by saying the two months since doing Eagleman my training has been less than stellar. In fact, I can honestly say I've been in the pool maybe twice and been swimming at the lake twice. That's a grand total of four swim sessions in two months. I've ridden my bike a little more frequently, once a week on most weeks, and I may have logged 15 - 20 miles running. Seriously, I was behaving as if this race wasn't going to happen.

Yes, every picture I have is before sunrise because I got to the part before 5 a.m.!

But as I stood among 2,000 athletes ready to start a race they actually prepared for, I completely questioned my sanity. I tried to remind myself that I did finish a 70.3 two months ago. I can totally do this distance. But the buoys looked so far away. Everyone around me was smiling in anticipation. I was shivering with fear. In fact, I spend the whole weekend fighting off the fear that something terrible was going to happen to me during this race. I was going to a race with no one. I had no support with me. Just me. Alone. I wrote my kids a note in the morning reminding them that I loved them, just in case.

Clearly, I was feeling out of my mind.

See those buoys? Can you see them? Look how far they look?

Swim:
Back to the water's edge. Lake Nockamixon is actually a really beautiful lake, but on Sunday I didn't see its beauty, I simply focused on its size. With a water temperature of 80 degrees, it was not a wetsuit legal race, so I wore my skin suit. We had the option to wear wetsuits, but you'd be disqualified for awards. I sort of wish I had chosen to wear mine. I'm not winning any awards, but I wanted to try without it. In hindsight, I should've worn it. When the gun went off, I started swimming. It seemed to take an eternity to get to the first buoy. The next buoy also seemed very far away. I focused on swimming buoy-to-buoy. One after the other I swam passed them. None seemed to come faster than the next. I got out of the water and saw the :40 min mark and although that time was disappointing, I knew I had no business expecting to swim any faster than I did. My official swim time was :40:03

Bike:
I will admit I heard nothing but horror stories about the hills on this ride. I had no expectations other than to ride as hard as I could. That's what I did. The climb out of the park was tough, but not nearly has hard as I thought it was going to be, and the rest of the course pretty much followed that same line of thinking. There were a few pretty good climbs, but nothing that was insanely difficult. During the first climb out of the park, the little packet in my pocket that held my Enduralytes fell to the ground. Fortunately, it fell right in front of a volunteer who ran to it and yelled what's your number, I'll get it back to you. I panicked for a second worried that I'd cramp like crazy without them. But sometimes you just cannot worry about things beyond your control. So, I just let it go and focused on the ride. My ride time was 1:31:22, that's a 17.7 mph average. I am happy with that.

Run:
I started this run waiting for my legs to cramp. Having no Enduralytes to help if they did, I was just waiting... but guess what. They never cramped. This was encouraging. I felt strong the entire run. It was a beautiful paved, shaded course through the park. I really enjoyed the run. Water stops were frequent and stocked with Gatorade, water and ice. I was feeling so good, I really thought I was going to make the 10k in under an hour. I was close, 1:02:43, but not quite. I finished feeling great. I was a little disappointed to not have my kids meet me at the finish like they normally do, but I was happy to see Joanna there at the end.

I finished this race with the time of 3:19:17. This is 15 minutes faster than my previous best Olympic distance time. Seriously, I cannot believe it. I didn't really deserve to PR during a race I wasn't prepared to do, however, I will take it. 

Overall, I thought Steelman was a great race and we were blessed with beautiful weather. As an athlete who is not finishing in the top half, it was nice to see volunteers at all the stations throughout the entire race. I hate when you're running and you come to an aid station that just has cups and coolers because the volunteers left. It's defeating, but this was not the case at all at Steelman.

I'm glad I did this race. I wasn't going to, but Joanna helped make it possible for me. Thank you Joanna. It was a great race to end a tough season. Oh, and as a side note, my packet of Enduralytes were sitting at my transition when I got back to it. How awesome is that?!