No bike, no bike (sung to the tune of Noiseworks' "No Lies")

Yep, no bike. Went for a ride on Saturday on my ancient Avanti Breeze and the gear shifter jammed. So, it went to Avanti Manukau and it's basically DOA. It could be fixed - but by the time I've spent a few hundred on it, I may as well buy a secondhand decent road bike. Bugger. I am presently bikeless, and with my first tri under three weeks away, this ain't good. I can't do the whole brand new bike thing right now, but there's a girl at work selling a secondhand Avanti Sprint which I may have to check out.


Found an awesome quote online today - "It's not the life you lead, it's the courage you bring to it" ~ Sri Singh Sahib Yogi Bhajan. He's jolly well right. And speaking of inspiring people, Google Rudy Garcia-Tolson. He's my current inspiration.


I have a sore arm, a sore shoulder and a sore back. Like, can't move them sore!!! Mental note to self, going to for a run in the rain with your trainer is fine. Doing your weight training after said run is fine. But then playing badminton afterwards is a recipe for disaster of the one-handed typing kind. Not good! Owie!!!


I also have new speedo bathers (togs, swimmers, etc) coming courtesy of $22.45 spent on nzsale.co.nz - Awesome. Should be here in about three weeks, which will be handy. My current ones are getting a little big and the other pair will probably be the same by then! Final thought for the day?

"If God invented marathons to keep people from doing anything more stupid, triathlon must have taken Him completely by surprise." ~ P. Z. Pearce

New Shoes!!!

I had the most awesome PT session last night. This guy really knows his stuff, and with my first event slightly over three weeks away we’re ramping up before the pre-race taper.

After having yet more “squats with dumbbells and shoulder press” exercises loaded on me, pushing 150 pounds on the leg press and then doing a 10km time trial on the bike, my legs actually feel great today. I must be getting stronger and have my recovery routine sorted out again. However, I think it’s going to be another week before my body gets back to normal with the nutrition after the Wellington trip. Poor body!

Last night was also fantastic because I now have proper running shoes and did last night’s gym session in them. I am now running in Asics, thanks to the wonderful Tatiana and Rachel at Shoe Clinic. I have loads of Asics running gear already, but now I have the shoes to match. So, I guess this means my last excuse to avoid running is out the door, darn it.

Tatiana gave me some running tips, basically centred on the fact that with my knees and kneecaps structured the way they are, I run like a penguin version of Forest Gump. Rachel is a podiatrist and gave me some more running tips, but basically I’m not going to hurt myself running the way I do now. I just need to make some small tweaks to my “style” and keep up my leg work in the gym and on the bike. More bike, more weights, more squats.

I found my favourite brand of gels is about 25% cheaper at Shoe Clinic than the health stores. Triathlon is a bloody expensive sport, so this was cool. Shoes, gels and a bottle of Shoe Clinic water for well under $300? Legend.

The PT will be taking me out running on Sunday morning, which is great because I need someone who won’t put up with my bitching and moaning, and he is an Olympic medallist in some running area. I’m also going to have to start running on my own which scares me a bit. I live in one of the least illustrious parts of New Zealand, but I can always drive somewhere nicer and run.

No excuses!!!

A can of whoop-ass

Had an awesome session with my PT last night. He rocks, but I rock more, I'm going to kick some serious butt at my first triathlon! Okay, so I may not get to go all "Waterboy" and open a can of whoop-ass on the others in my distance or my age group, but as long as I finish before the cutoff I will be stoked! This is not all fun and games. I'm usually so tired when I get home that all I want to do is eat and sleep. I end up doing at least two and sometimes three loads of washing a week (for one person, i.e. me!) thanks to all the gym, swim and bike/run gear on top of the work clothes and play clothes. I stink of chlorine three days a week, the calluses on my hands have calluses, and all the training is on top of fulltime work and a fulltime uni course load. At least I don't get blisters! So why the heck am I doing this to myself? To be honest, I have no idea what is driving me, except the conviction that I have to do this. It's not easy - but then nothing worth doing ever is. No one said it would be easy, and if it was easy I sure as heck wouldn't be able to look back in six months and appreciate where I started from, let alone the journey in getting to the destination. The way I see it, is that I sat around on my butt for 32 years doing nothing courageous, outrageous or totally crazy. This way, I kill all three birds with one half ironman. Awesome! This time four years ago, I couldn't even walk 100 metres without crutches and a serious limp. Now, I'm training to run a half marathon after a 2km swim and a 90km bike! It's all about how badly you want something. I've always been impulsive, impetuous, stubborn, pig-headed and a few other less salubrious things. But, I want to complete that half ironman really badly - and I will complete it. I may not win, I may not place, I may well be last in my age group. I don't care, as long as I finish before the cutoff time. Bring it on.

Owie ouchy ow!

I've come to two conclusions. One, I'd much rather be a fulltime sponsored triathlete than stuck in an office all day. The main reason for this is that sitting down all day is hell, especially if you've gone hard the night before and felt okay. As soon as you get up from being sat down for a couple of hours, suddenly your calves, quads and hammies start to complain. Ugh! Conclusion number two, my legs still hurt from Sunday. I went and did a 25km easy bike tonight to loosen them up, and my evil plan worked a charm. No soreness! I was considering going home and slothing on the couch, so, take that laziness!!! Tomorrow I'm going to enter my first triathlon. My swimming is going well, my run time is starting to drop and my bike is awesome. A little more training and I think I'll be right.

Squats, lunges and other torture...

I went to uni tonight to meet with my skills coach. We went through my own programme and had a chat about it. He liked the simplicity, the fact that every exercise prescribed relates to my goals and specific training areas, and the way it was written. Well done Mr PT!

My skills coach did question one of the squats exercises (with dumbbells, squat into standing bicep curl into standing shoulder press) as apparently it’s quite advanced and tricky, but when I explained that I can do them and do them well, and that the only problem I have with the exercise is a mental one, he got the picture.

Basically, I’ve spent seven years telling myself I can’t do squats or lunges. For one year out of that seven, I had surgeons and physiotherapists telling me not to do them. So, after seven years of reinforcement, my brain says no when my body says yes. It’s just a matter of conditioning my nervous system and it will take a bit of time. Maybe a format and rebuild of my hard drive would help?

Bring on training tomorrow, I know I will be thrashed but I need it

Triathlon entered!

Okay people, I'm now officially entered in my first triathlon. I'm doing the Try-a-tri distance at the Panasonic People's Tri on December 13 at Mission Bay. It happens to be my Dad's birthday and I believe in signs, so this will be a great birthday present for him - once I tell him about it! So, my first tri is in 3.5 weeks. Aaarrrggghhh!!! It's only a baby one (100m swim, 10km bike, 2km run) but it's my first one and to be honest, I'm a little freaked. As a noob, I have like a million questions and there's next to no info on the website that is of any use! I have a couple of triathlete friends and my tutorial leader at Uni is a triathlete so I have experienced people around to ask. Plus, I am reading everything I can get my hands on. So, here goes with the training!

There's no place like home

I am soooo glad to be back in my own bed, in control of my nutrition again instead of being at the mercy of New World Wakefield Street, and I'm even more pleased to be back in my gym for a session with my fantastic trainer this morning. I'm starting to think that travelling for fun while training for triathlons isn't such a great plan. I like to be in realtive control of my environment (e.g. not in a total dictatorial way, but being the mistress of my own destiny instead of having to rely on supermarkets and suboptimal gyms in farway cities). I found this trip rather disconcerting and quite stressful! I think that maybe if it had been Sydney or Melbourne, it would have been different :-) I am starting to feel a bit sore and might have overdone the training today. I did two hours in the gym with increased weights and increased core training, a pace ride, and then a 500m swim at the pool up the road - I think it's time for a protein shake and a lie down! My measurements and skinfolds are all down, which rocks. My weight aint shifting, but my bodyfat is well down so clearly there is muscle going on and fat coming off. Awesome! Bet I'm going to hurt tomorrow...

Wellywood is freezing!

It's been blimming well freezing in Wellywood, and I don't do being cold. There has been lots of fast walking going on to try and stay warm! The temperature is in the early teens, but the wind chill is making it drop to barely over double digits. Mental note to self - next time, bring snowboarding jacket! Travel is always a challenge, but this time it's a bit of a mare. I have to eat every couple of hours and have quite a restricted diet at the moment (no junk, no grog, no choccie, no excess sugar or fat, etc etc etc) - and that's before we consider my multitude of food allergies. We were staying in a hostel which has a supermarket across the road, which has been my saving grace. It's been back and forth to the supermarket for breakfast, lunch and dinner, snacks, milk...etc. Four or five times a day, it was off to grab something else! Packing to come down was interesting too as I had gym gear, swim gear, protein, normal clothes, trainers, jandals and thermals. This all had to fit in a 10kg baggage allowance on the way down, and a 7kg on the way back. My advice for travelling with carry-on baggage only? Pack stuff you are happy to dispose of before you go home. I deliberately took things that were two sizes too big thanks to all my training and dropped them off in the clothing recycle bin at the hostel after washing them on our last day. Sorted! And take books - audio or real ones. When you're a total nana like I am these days and want to go to bed at 8pm because you're tired, it helps to have things to read :-)

33 metre pools and other gyms are indeed different

Okay, so swimming in a 25 metre pool is a bit girly. Especially when you have the 33 metre Freyberg pool in Wellington to swim in for four days! I went down, swam a bit over half a km (managed to bamboozle myself with maths for a change) and came out feeling great. Rock on! I may not be the fastest swimmer around, but hey, it's the technique and the distance that count. I am missing my gym terribly. I got a big shock when I went into club physical on Manners Street. I was shocked that there was one person on the desk but no staff on the gym floor. Their stationary bikes weren't great and they had weird reebok machines. My gym may not be Les Mills or be kitted out with TechnoGym (mmmm, TechnoGym *drooling like homer simpson*), but it has awesome Life Fitness equipment and there is always at least one person on the gym floor. Meh! To cut a long story short, I lasted probably seven minutes at Club Physical, then got miffed and left. I decided a swim was a much better option and I was right. I just can't sit around for days on end and do nothing - I turn into robobitch now. Not a good look! Mental note to self - when I buy my own gym in a few years, it's going to be the shizzle!

Busted!

I hurt like heck today after a bloody hard gym session last night. And to top it off, my trainer busted me in the supermarket looking at fresh pasta sauce - then lurked in the shadows while I got my vogels bread! LOL! For those of you overseas who aren't expat Kiwis, Vogels is the most asesome wholegrain bread. I like the 12 grain one, which I never seem to tire of - the mixed grain did my head in after a month, and I stumbled on the 12 grain quite by accident (i.e. grabbed the wrong loaf at the supermarket, got home, incinerated it in the toasted and since then it's all I buy). In other news, my iPod is back from hospital. It now has a shiny new screen, courtesy of a five year extended warranty I took out at purchase. A warning for those of you with a 30GB or 60GB video iPod (circa 2005) - your screen will crap out, with lovely horizontal rows of pixels dying across your screen. The bad news is that it's taken all night to copy all my 12,000 songs back onto it. Epic time fail.

Swimming lessons are going well - I love Swimsation swim school :-) I first learnt to swim with Hilton Brown (yes, THE Hilton Brown) back in primary school and from memory I got pretty good at it, but then got to teenagerhood and all of a sudden swimming wasn't cool. I should have kept at it - I wasn't cool either - so swimming and I could have been good outcast nerdy friends. Ah well!

I'm off to Wellington next week and have discovered Freyberg Pool at Oriental Bay, hopping distance from the accommodation. The gym situation looks a little grim, but there will be plenty of walking done so I think I can probably take four days off the weights and bike with the usual big improvements showing next week.

Time to pack my bags and head for bed - have a great day tomorrow everyone!

All systems are go

Went and saw my knee specialist yesterday about my right knee. I haven't been to see him since my 6-month left knee post-op appointment in January 2006. I was pulled and pushed and prodded and twisted and bent and yanked. I explained that I wanted to do the short course at the Auckland Half Ironman in March 2010, and he asked me why I was only doing the short course! Turns out there's nothing wrong with my right knee, and I'm cleared to do the full Half Ironman. Crikey! Anyway, the clearance has fired me right up. I did my usual hour of weights last night followed by one hour bike and then I went for a very short run. I can run!!! Yay!!! I can't run far, or for very long, but I CAN run and there's nothing physiological stopping me now. Onward - there's only 4.5 months to go!