System Reboot

I recently returned from Tuscaloosa, AL for the 2009 USA Triathlon Age Group National Championships. I made the 8-hr trip by myself in the Zipp minivan, which got a lot of double takes along the way and even a snapped picture from a passing car full of triathletes. I learned an important lesson during the drive down; Minivan suspension is sweet.

I worked the race expo as the sole representative from Zipp. It was my first time doing such, and on the whole it was pretty straight forward and enjoyable. The most common question asked - "You got any free wheels?!" ...So funny I forgot to laugh.

The race went fairly well, and I did a pretty good job trying to salmon my way up the current made when the upstream dam was opened just before the start. Oddly enough, I tied my bike split PR. The encouraging part is that I managed to equal my fastest bike time with minimal training. The discouraging part is that now my 3 fastest bike splits are 1:00:27 (2006), 1:00:27 (2007), and 1:00:27 (2009). My arms and legs remained attached to my torso during the run, bonus points for that... Really though, I had a pretty good run considering the small training volume I put in this year. My one and only goal for next year is to break 2hrs on a legitimate Olympic distance course. I will continue with a full training schedule through to next season with hopes of getting pretty fast.

The REAL highlight of the trip was the delicious southern sustenance I stuffed down my gullet after the race. Let me give you the blow-by-blow;

11am - Too hungry to wait for lunch, PB + J never tasted so good.

Noon - Five Guys burgers and fries, just greasy and meek enough to be considered fast food, but just substantial enough to impress you. 64oz of Coke is too much to drink with a bacon cheeseburger AND a sack of fries...

5pm - Watching the professional race worked up an appetite. The Krispy Kreme "HOT" sign was on. Those 5 tasty little round guys were too tasty and little and round for their own good. It was a merciful takedown.

6pm - After a 4 year leave, I was back at the parking lot of the legendary Dreamland BBQ. 2 new things were added to the menu, so I had to try one of everything; Wonderbread (i.e. edible napkins), ribs, smoked sausage (new!), and baked beans (new!). Did I mention they serve their baked beans with disposable plastic SPORKS!

7pm - To the Houndstooth! Don't ask for a white russian - they "don't do those kinds of drinks here." If you want milk with your alcohol, there's a convenience store down the street, boy!

9pm - WHAT?! Turn around! A Dippin' Dots drive through? The peanut butter chip did not have chocolate chips, and it tasted more like milk and cereal than peanut butter, but it was still awesomely cold and stank of the future.

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-SLEEP INTERMISSION-
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10am - The Waysider has room for 20, but you can fit 30 (+2 waitresses) if you can depend on a couple helpful patrons to pass orders across tables. Bacon, hash browns, and a short stack made the starting list, and the specialty home-made biscuits were either some super secret recipe slathered in butter, or they were popped out of a can and slathered in butter (it's deliciously irrelevant, either way).

I was having such a good time hanging with old friends and gorging that when we finished breakfast and walked outside, it was like a slap in the face when I suddenly realized I had to get directly in the car and drive 8-hrs back home. Oh well. At least my belly was full.

Track Racing!

After only one weekend of track racing, I'm hooked!

Welcome Back to Racing!

Training has been dodgy at best these past few months. I decided to enter a bike race this weekend, so I figured I should put in some training time on the bike. With a solid 14hrs on the bike under my belt this week, I thought I'd be golden for the race... ;-) The actual race went quite well, though my result was not what I had hoped for. My greatest accomplishment of the day was avoiding the mid-race pile up and finishing the day unscathed. Despite a good setup at the end of the race, I had no giddyup for the final sprint and finished mid pack.

This training thing is not catching on like I hoped it would. Time to pony up and commit to some regimented workouts.

Next race: Eagle Creek Park Crit on May 9

A Bicycle!?

I just got home from the most exhausting bike ride I've had since arriving in Indianapolis. It was, surprisingly, the 4.1 mile route I ride to and from work every day, taken through windy suburban neighborhoods.

'How is this so', you ask? I shall deliberate no longer!

I make it a point to ride my bike to work as much as possible, but even more so on snowy (or otherwise treacherous) occasions. I prefer the lazy, quiet backroads on my bike to the fast and scary highway in my car. It snowed today, though it was nothing spectacular. The forecast warned 3-6" over the course of the day, and by the time I left work the forecast had been fulfilled...little more than 3" of snow had stuck to the ground. As I began to ride, I soon realized that I was quite unstable, and quite unable to steer in a straight line. This was no ordinary 3" of snow. It might as well have been 6" of thick mud. I struggled both to stay upright and to comprehend why such a seemingly small amount of snow was giving me so much trouble. I turned off a small side street onto a bigger road...the snow was just as deep, though tire ruts made it even harder to keep the bike underneath me. As I labored, I imagined being in a cyclocross race negotiating a sand pit, 4.1 miles long. Soon I began to sweat, and I stopped on the side of the road to remove my balaclava and one layer of gloves. The trek continued, and the falling snow turned to stinging sleet. I let out a string of expletives occasionally - some for the sleet, some for the startle of catching a hidden rut, and others just for good measure. This odyssey was far from over.

I surged to gain speed and keep up with moving traffic across the one busy intersection encountered in my daily commute, and after I slowed down in the following neighborhood my legs and body began a familiar whine. I was bonking! 3 miles of riding and I had run out of energy...I shouldn't have offered that cookie to my co-worker at lunch. I began to feel cold and exhausted. I stopped on the side of the road again to don the clothing I had recently removed. Grinding away in the easiest gear, I struggled along, my front and rear tires slipping wildly to whichever direction they fancied. A severe case of Tourette's wouldn't have made it any more difficult to ride in a straight line.

I crossed a bridge that spanned over the major highway on which I would have driven my car to work. Traffic was crawling, and I stopped for a moment to gawk at the sludgy snow raked high between tire tracks. Near home I spotted a limping old man walking in the middle of the lane of oncoming traffic. Cars had to stop and snake around him. Not knowing if he was looking for an escaped cat or had himself broken out, I trucked on to the next turn where my front door beckoned. I pulled into the parking lot of my apartment complex and approached a man taking out his garbage. When I rolled passed him, he looked at me and said, incredulously, "A bicycle?! You crazy?!"

I am not entirely sure whether his last words were meant as a query or an exclamation.

New Home

My apartment is set up, finally. Take a gander at the photos below if you care to see the living room, complete with new couch. I am steadily getting more settled into life in Indianapolis. The cold and ice are still difficult to tolerate, but Spring is nigh, no?


A training plan is also slowly coming in to form. I started riding on the rollers at work after the workday is over, and I'll begin running a few days a week during lunch, and swimming after work a couple times a week. Perhaps I'll be able to show my face at a few races this Summer and not shame myself.

Work has been a whirlwind since the day I started. Every day I become more confident in the workings of the company and I learn more and more about what exactly my job entails. It's hectic and stressful at times, but usually only when I'm trying to do something I've never done before. The catch is, by nature my job will always have me doing things I've never done before. I suppose in a way, you can get accustomed to doing unfamiliar things after time. Although it may not be peaches and cream every day I go into work, I can tell that once I grow into the company and the job position a bit more, this job will be exactly what it's cracked up to be.