Week Eighteen

I'm proud of myself for this week. This was "show week." I directed our school play, and during this week, I had my regular full time teaching job, plus rehearsal every day from 4:30 - 7, and the show on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. I managed to keep my training going, which was no small feat, and it felt great to prove to myself how dedicated I can be to this:

On Tuesday, I woke up at 5:00 AM to get in my hour of spinning. After work, I had a staff meeting, and then rehearsal. When I got home at 8, I did the second part of my workout, my 30 minutes of running. On Wednesday, since I had to miss track practice for rehearsal, I did my running in between the school day dismissal and the start of rehearsal. On Thursday, I actually paid $15 to be a guest at my friend Krissy's pool in Los Gatos, just to get in my swim workout for an hour. It was a beautiful pool, 100 feet long, and the weather was great, too! I had forgotten how nice it was to swim when the sun is on your back rather than 35 degree wind! On Friday, I actually brought my bike to work to ride after school. I rode a loop that was new to me, but well known in Los Gatos. It was a great ride. The weather was warm and perfect, the ride had just the right amount of hills, and I felt really strong! I realized that while I don't think I'm getting faster at the hills yet, I'm doing them more easily. They don't hurt so badly anymore, which must be a good sign! :-)

Saturday morning was my first longer bike ride. I was supposed to go for about 3.5 hours. I decided to ride out to pigeon point lighthouse and back. I often ride by myself, and enjoy it. I know that I'll be alone during Ironman France, and so it's really good for me to practicing finding my strength and encouragement from within. I was really proud of the pace I was keeping, despite small headwinds. I was keeping an average of about 15 mph, which for me is great. On the other side of the road, I saw some Team in Training folks also ride. I yelled, "Go Team," and they yelled back, "Go IRONteam!" Ironteam! I was wearing my cool new Ironteam jacket. I'll admit to feeling really proud and excited at those words, "Go IRONteam!" I've been hearing and yelling "Go team" for 6 seasons now, and adding that little word "iron" to it made me realize just how much more I'm going for this season. Crazy.

Anyway, I felt great excitement when I saw the lighthouse as I had never ridden that far yet. I ate a few ginger snaps, rested and stretched a bit (that darn right hammy!) and turned around to come back home. I was looking forward to those tailwinds, and I was so excited to feel them pushing me along, making every push of the pedal feel so easy! And then, all of a sudden, it started getting soooo hard to pedal! I wondered if the winds had changed, and tried pedaling harder. Why was I only going 9 mph? Where were my tailwinds? And that constant clicking sound is really starting to annoy me!

Constant clicking sound? Huh?

I pulled to the side to find the source of the clicking, which made me also realize the source of me having so much difficulty riding. I had a flat on my back tire. "No worries," I thought. I had everything I needed with me: a tire iron, a new tube, and a co2 cartridge to blow it back up again. I had changed a tire once before (with the help of a friend rather than alone) and I knew how to do this. I also welcomed the practice, as a bicyclist needs to know how to do this.

Being so independent, the last thing I wanted was to be saved. This aspect of my personality can be really great or really annoying, depending on your perspective. I didn't want anyone stopping to ask if I needed help. So, I pulled my bike behind a rock so that no one would see me from the road before I started changing the tire.

Then, a guy on a motorcycle came up. "Oh, great," I thought. All I wanted was to change the tire by myself! I kept my eyes down on what I was doing, but I glanced at him occasionally. He got off his bike, looked out at the ocean for a while, went back to his bike, took off his shirt (which freaked me out a little), put on a warmer shirt (ah, felt better about that), got back on his bike, and left. And then of course the hypocrite in me rose with anger, thinking, "How rude that he didn't even ask if I needed help!" The poor guy had no chance of winning that situation. :-) Like I said, my independent side can really annoy people.

As he left, a guy in a pickup truck pulled by, and he did ask if I needed any help. I kindly told him no, proud that I had all the tools I needed to be self-sufficient. He pulled away.

I'm sure anyone reading this journal right now is probably thinking: Jenn's going to learn a big lesson from this stubborn side of hers. They're right.

I got the tire off, removed the tube, and checked for the cause of the flat. There were definitely some nicks and cuts in my tire, but no obvious pieces of glass or anything that had to be removed. I got out my new tube, blew it up with my mouth a little as the guys at the Bike Station taught me to do, and put the tube onto the wheel. I worked the tire back in, and now I was ready to pump it up, and go!

I took out my CO2 cartridge, which I had never used before. It had two parts, once which screws onto the other. It took me a few tries to realize that I was trying to screw the wrong side of the nozzle to the cartridge. Once I figured out the right way to do it, I did it nice and slowly and carefully. Nice, slowly, carefully was mistake number one. I let some air out of the cartridge before I realized you had to quickly seal it to not lose it all. (There is only enough air in a cartridge to pump up one tire one time.) Okay, got the pieces together. it was then time to pump up the tire and go!

This was the point that I realized that I had no idea how to use this crazy cartridge to actually pump up the tire. I put the opening on the nozzle, but nothing happened. I looked for some sort of release, something to let the air start coming out, but I just couldn't figure it out for the life of me.

I picked up my cell phone to call bike stud Rob Straka. He for sure would be able to explain this gadget to me and get me on my way. Darn- no cell signal, so no help from Rob.

Recognizing defeat, I picked up my bike, along with my humility, and brought it over to the side of the road, back where the passing traffic could see me. I realized it was time for a good samaritan to help this stubborn "let me do it myself" girl to get rolling again. Sigh...

While I waited, I studied that darn CO2 cartridge some more. I tested what would happen if I tried to compress the spring on top. Air! That was a good sign and a bad sign. Good in that I was starting to figure out how to use this god forsaken thing, and bad in that I lost more air that was supposed to be put in the tire. I put the cartridge back on the nozzle, and pressed really hard, trying to compress the spring. Some air went in!!!! It definitely wasn't enough, but I got a good start.

At that point, a cyclist stopped by. "Are you okay?" he asked.

"I'm not so sure if I am or not." I swallowed my pride to say. My comfort grew when I saw his shirt - the words GO TEAM! screaming out to me as if to remind me why I was out there in the first place. He had a fancy pump that one of those cartridges gets attached to, and as he started to use it, a Team in Training SAG (support and gear) vehicle pulled up, from a north bay cycling team. He pulled out his floor pump, pumped up my tire, and even offered me a rag to clean off my hands.

I thanked him as hugely as I could (although I realized that there was no way to truly find an adequate way to say thanks), and I was finally good to go.

Go figure, when you are at the end of your rope, leave it to Team in Training to help you get back on track again. GO TEAM!

This week's statistics:
Monday: Rest
Tuesday: Spin 60 minutes, run 30 minutes (3 miles)
Wednesday: run 4 miles
Thursday: swim, somewhere between 2000 and 2500 yards
Friday: bike, 12 miles, with hills (Shannon - Hicks - Kennedy loop - fun!)
Saturday: bike to pigeon point, 54 miles, 3:40 ride time
Sunday: swim 3600 yards

Body check: My upper hamstring hurt quite a lot during the bike ride, but the pain is totally gone when I stop riding.