Week Thirty-Two

Long Journal Alert! :-)

This week went by fast! I rested on Monday (of course), and had a 90 minute, incredibly painful but good, sports massage on Tuesday. On Wednesday, I went to track, but after doing the drills, my shins were firing up - little sharp pains everywhere. I stretched for the rest of track while everyone ran because Coach Mike has been encouraging me to recover and not overdo it.

There were a few fun things that happened this week that are worth journaling about:

One, is Thursday night. Thursday night was the benefit concert for my little Choir for a Cure and The Stomp Out Cancer Dancers. Over 50 kids participated in this event. We had a packed house, standing room only (and there were a LOT of people standing!) The kids totally exceeded my expectations. Their behavior was awesome, and they sang and danced GREAT! While it was free admission, I talked to the audience about the donation box on the back table... and we raised over $2200 that night alone! If you add up all of the fundraising from this endeavor (registration, open house bake sale, and benefit concert), we raised over $12,000 for The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Holy cow, that's a lot! That, with my regular letter writing, has brought my entire fundraising to something over $15,500! I definitely think that makes this season a success, no matter what ends up happening at my race. :-)

Friday was fun, and worth mentioning. It was our school's "Bulldog Stampede," a jog-a-thon fundraiser. Since a 5 mile run was on my schedule, I decided to do it at the Stampede. With 5 laps per mile, I had a parent mark my hand for every lap I completed. Training on my own and with the team is fun, but nothing compares to being able to run and talk with my students for 25 laps. I got to have conversations about topics for which there is never enough time in school, and I learned so much about these kids that I didn't know, despite seeing them 30 hours a week since August. When I'm on the run course at IMF, I totally want to remember some of those moments and imagine running along side some of these little cuties. What an inspiration!

Then there was Saturday. My solo 97-mile-long-hundred-miler. :-) My course was designed (thank goodness) by my coach this time, and it was a really beautiful ride. I started at Los Gatos High School, and rode out to San Jose. It was cool to ride past the trail that the team has run on so often, and to ride out to Harry, where Andrew and I rode a couple of weeks ago. This part of the ride felt great, of course, because it was early in the day, and not too warm out. I rode back into Los Gatos, and out to highway 9. I stopped at the gas station on the corner before Hwy 9 turns left and went in to ask for the bathroom key. He looked at me and said, "Customers only." I'm a pretty patient person, except when someone tells me I can't use their bathroom. :-) I think I said something like, "But if you are mean to me, why would I want to become a customer?" And he gave me the key. Phew. I filled up my bottles and headed back out to Hwy 9.

Hwy 9 started out as a gentle climb. Truthfully, it was a gentle climb the whole time. But, it was a LONG gentle climb, and it was starting to get really hot, and, well, it wasn't feeling very gentle after a while. For the first time ever on any of my climbs, I pulled off and rested my head on my handlebars until my heartrate came down. I actually did this like 3 or 4 times. How embarrassing when other cyclists passed by asking if I was okay. ("Yeah, just being a wuss in the heat...")

Hwy 35 was a much better stretch. It's beautiful up there, despite the heat. There was a point at which I thought I may have passed 84 without realizing it, so I stopped and checked on my phone navigator (more time lost). Turns out I just had to trust myself and keep going.... Anyway, when I got to 84, I stopped at the market on the corner for another water bottle fill-up. I was going through water like... well, like water! Some people were asking me where I was heading today, and what my distance was. Their being impressed partly made me feel very proud, and partly made me feel like what I was doing was truly crazy. That stop was probably about 15 minutes. More time lost.

Anyway, I felt great after that water stop. Rested, refueled, and energized. I took 84 out to Woodside, which started looking familiar. I realized I was there from a team ride several weeks (months?) back. I remembered Canada, which I was about to turn on, and expected the headwinds that greeted me on the way out. I didn't mind it too much, knowing that I'd have tail winds after I turned around at 92. (The tail winds weren't as dramatic as I thought they'd be, though!)

The whole Whisky Hill - Sand Hill - Portola stretch seemed harder than it should have for me. It was a gentle climb, and it surprised me how slow I was on it. At this point, I was really starting to feel tired. There was a short downhill reprieve, and then there was a steady climb from about mile 75 - 90, which again, felt harder than I think it probably was. I don't remember much of this part. I do remember hitting a lot of lights on Foothill, and feeling conflicted between wanting to be forced to stop and not wanting my average mph to drop. :-)

I thought that the next section, Stevens Canyon, sounded familiar. I was wondering where I heard that before. And I saw that I was going to be turning left on Mt. Eden, and that also sounded very familiar, almost as though I had seen it in writing somewhere before. I sort of put that thought in the back of my head to deal with my strong stomach cramps that were coming on as I progressed up Stevens Canyon. Then, I finally got to the intersection of Stevens Canyon and Mt. Eden and it hit me: that was where I had gotten my ticket for not stopping at the stop sign (on my bike) during our practice triathlon last spring. After thoroughly stopping at the stop sign, I continued up Mt. Eden. Mt. Eden shouldn't have felt that hard. It's not a very long climb - but I actually stopped and rested twice going up it. The heat was really messing with me. I figured I was close enough to the end to waste some water, so I poured a whole bottle into the holes of my helmet and down my back, and just tried to cool myself off.

By this point, the worst of the ride was definitely over, and I was pretty much able to enjoy the downhill and the tailwinds all the way back to my car. I considered riding an extra 3 miles to make it a full 100, but I was over it by that point! My bike computer, which may be very inaccurate, said I averaged 13.1, which is 1 mph slower than where I really want it to be for France, but considering the heat, I think I did a decent job.

So, I got home, washed my favorite bike jersey and water bottles, packed for the next day, and went to bed. My alarm went off at 4:30 for the Uvas triathlon...

The Uvas triathlon is a unique distance triathlon: .75 mile swim, 16 mile bike, and 5 mile run. I went into it feeling complacent (probably from being so tired from yesterday), and not really having a healthy respect of the distance. I learned a humbling lesson, as it really wasn't an easy race for me. When I started the swim, I felt tired. My arms just didn't want to pull, my legs didn't really want to kick... I thought I'd just take it easy and focus on my form and my sighting. I lined each buoy up with a more prominent land feature in the distance, and went for it in a straight line. Several swimmers were zig zagging in front of me. Some swimmers hit me by accident and moved away, others repeatedly hit me with each stroke, giving me the message that I was the one who had to move. One swimmer, who I think was trying to get past me, grabbed my wetsuit at the nape of my neck and pulled back! In all of the open water swims I had ever done, this one was definitely the meanest. I came out of the water in a bit of a funk, but Coach Dan was there ready to strip off my wetsuit, which totally made me smile and cheered me up. (It's just funny to have someone do that so quickly!) I had a very fast transition, and headed out on the bike.

The bike was really hard at first. My muscles were so tired from yesterday, and everyone was passing me (including a really rude guy who kept yelling things like, "Move it! No blocking! Move it!" to anyone in his sight). After the first few miles, I did warm up, and was able to keep a more respectable pace. :-) I finished the ride in 58 minutes, which is right around a 16 mph average. At the T2, Coach Dan was there again. He "valeted" my bike, which was much appreciated. I ran to the bathroom, changed my shoes and hat, and headed out.

I started the run with Chris, but he was way to fast for me to keep up. Now, the run was very surprising. I could have sworn while I was running the "out" part of this "out and back" course, that the first half was all downhill. I was dreading having to turn around, because I couldn't imagine running uphill for 2.5 miles. I was shocked that nobody going the other way was walking. (I thought for sure I would be when I got there!) I had a gel and an enduralyte right when I started, but I had no energy in the first 2.5 miles. I was running, but it couldn't have been a very fast pace. Everyone was passing me. At the turn-around, my throat constricted and it was very hard to breathe. I walked, took 2 hits of my inhaler, another gel, and another enduralyte. After about a minute of walking, I could feel my airway open up again. I knew that if I lost it emotionally, I'd lose my airway, so I focused really hard on calming myself down. I stopped looking for other iron-teamers to cheer on, stopped talking to other runners, and just looked forward, and very consciously slowed down my breathing (to about 3 to 4 steps per breath). I can't believe how well this worked. I probably sounded very silly, like I was practicing Lamaze or something, but it totally worked. I started running faster, and so much more comfortably! I didn't notice the uphill on the way back. In fact, I'm not even sure now if it actually was a climb on the way back, or if I just perceived it that way from the other side. Anyway, the breathing trick totally saved me.

The finish line was fun because they announce your name. No medals, though. That was a bummer! In all, I did the whole race in under 2:30 (I'm not sure by how much though) so I'm pretty happy with it.

Now I'm going to have a nap, then go soak in the ocean!

BODY CHECK: tight muscles in shoulders and neck, stiff legs, tight lower back, but nothing that worries me.