San Diego International Triathlon Race Report…
My thoughts before the race: what was I thinking doing a triathlon when I had done zero open water swims, no brick workouts, minimal biking and I truly mean minimal? Who was I to think I would be in “race shape,” after traveling and training, but not training nearly where I used to. Would I like racing shorter distances after the last few years of doing longer races? Is it silly that I would even show up to race?
I finally had a talk with myself the night before the race and answered my own questions. Why does it matter how much i’ve trained, or would I like the distance or how much i’ve biked. I signed up, and I love racing, so just go DO IT and have fun! Such a difficult mentality from someone who while they were pregnant would get passed by a walker at the lake and try to mow them down! Just “go have fun,”….easier said than done. No matter how little training I do, I still want to mow the person down in front of me. Doesn’t matter if I haven’t biked over 33 miles at one time this year (Vineman 70.3 will be painful i’m sure)…..or that I can’t remember the last time I practiced running off the bike, I need to go back to the reason why I started triathlon in the first place and that’s because it is FUN. I could…
Categories: Family & Friends, Nutrition, Product Reviews, Race Reports
Mental Notes
First off, on the way home from Quassy we got news that Lauren’s uncle had suffered a cardiac arrest. He was on day two of an MS150 bike ride in North Carolina which he had done many times before, in very hot and humid weather. He collapsed 5 miles from the finish line and by the grace of God was defibulated (sp?) very quickly. He went through some tough times over the following few hours and needed open heart surgery. We got word this morning that he was removed from the ventilator and is speaking although suffering some short term memory loss. God works in amazing ways and He definitely has bigger and better plans for Ken. He’s not out of the woods yet but the recent news is very encouraging.
Things like that really make you take a step back. Here’s a fit man in his 50’s that was seconds from not making it back home after a weekend of doing what he loves. We as humans and as athletes are truly blessed. Blessed that we have great families, great bodies, and an incredible country where we live free of violence, where our children can grow up without any worries and where we have an abundance of all of our needs. I don’t know why God has provided me with the blessings he has, but I am grateful that He has and I hope that I can glorify him…
Categories: Events, Nutrition, Product Reviews, Tips
Rev3 Quassy Race Report
Rev3 Quassy Weekend – Race Report
We headed out Friday morning…
After a relatively uneventful and “short” 3 hour drive, we arrived at our hotel. Was a pretty cool “resort” if you will called Heritage. Condo’s, hotel rooms, indoor and outdoor pool, meeting and reception areas, this place was huge…and about 10 minutes from the race site. The kids saw the pool and IMMEDIATELY wanted to go swimming, which we did for a while. I wanted to head over to the race site so I could find it Saturday morning when our team was manning the mile 1 water stop for the Olympic distance event being held that day. We met up with some Trakkers teammates and had a great dinner.
Saturday morning we woke up to some rain, so Lauren drove me over to the race site (instead of me riding over as originally planned). I headed down to the water
…
Categories: Athletes, Events, Family & Friends, Live Tracking, Nutrition, Product Reviews, Race Reports, Race Results, Racing, Running, Swimming, Team, Triathlons
Lessons From The Road
I started off a solid weekend of training with my old pal, Kim. I read her blog pretty regularly, so it feels like I see her all the time, but last week we realized that it has probably been three years since we’ve actually ridden together.For someone that lives 5 miles away from me, that is unacceptable. Time flies, eh?
We immediately amended this with a 50 mile ride on Saturday morning. Besides just catching up on all the “life” that happens between each other’s blog posts, I did some major brain picking about tips for ironman training. She rocked a major PR at ironman at Cozumel last year and I absolutely respect her training dedication. I tried to act like a sponge as much as I could during the whole ride.
This is what we decided.
- I admitted that I NEVER pee on the bike during races, even half ironmans. Nver. This is apparently a problem. I know that I need to get better about my pre-race hydration, and if I’m not peeing on the bike, I still probably haven’t fixed it. The goal is to have to pee somewhere around mile 35-45. This needs some testing, but should give me a good idea of how hydrated I actually am so that I can adjust my intake on the fly and I can rock the run.
- Don’t spend the day before bumming around the expo without a
…
Categories: Biking, Nutrition, Triathlons
Carlsbad 5000 Race Report
Albeit this is a week late…but, better late than never right? I think I have a hard time blogging these days because I think all my blog posts need to be “long,” and I feel pressure to write, so i’m just going to try and keep things short and to the point!
Dave and I were super stoked because the Carlsbad 5000 has a staggered start, so Dave would run, he’d have some time and then I would run so that gave us plenty of time for the “Soren hand off.” AND the starts were super late (9:25/10:25) so no getting up early and messing up everyone’s sleep schedule! The cards were in our favor. PLUS: It was Dave’s first race in over a year due to a leg injury, so he was curious to see how his speed would pan out. Man oh man, i’d give anything for his “slow” speed on my best day…more about that in a minute.
We get up to Carlsbad with plenty of time to spare, met up with Marit and Erin..Erin’s husband was gracious enough to put himself on call for the day at the hospital so Dave took his place (props to Mike Kent…THANKS MIKE!), we got our numbers and it was quickly time for Dave to line up. Marit was super awesome to come out and support us after she and Nate had a grueling hike the day before and left…
Categories: Nutrition, Product Reviews, Race Reports, Racing
Spring #i8this Challenge
My pal Christine is starting up her #i8this challenge again. If you want to be brought up to speed, here are all the details.
The last challenge was simply to tweet one pic of 1 meal per day with the hashtag “#i8this.” It didn’t have to be healthy. Most were healthy and the ones that weren’t added a fun and relaxed element that I believe is super important in having a nutritionally AND emotionally healthy diet. This time Christine is adding an additional element to the challenge by encouraging an effort to improve upon something.
Want to play along? Here are the rules:
1. Ask yourself “What aspect of my diet/ health would I most like to improve”?
- Find creative ways to incorporate more fruits/veggies into my diet.
2. Look at certain foods or habits that you may want to remove or add.
- No drastic changes. I eat pretty healthy. I just ned to do the super healthy meals a little more often.
3. Decide on a number of days that works for you (maybe 3, 5, 7 or 9).
- Nine. All the way.
4. Set your intention by making it known to other #i8this participants (via twitter or email Christine at christine@liveandeatbetter.com).
- See this post. Done.
5. Try to be ready to start by Friday, though it is flexible. You can start now if you want. You’re the boss.
- I like those rules. I’m a really awesome boss.
Product Review: EFS Liquid Shot
Hi, my name is Kati and I have a liquid shot problem. I have never been a gel eater. Even at mile 9 of a half marathon, running out of energy with no other nutrition available. I just can’t do it. For the last few years I have used different gummy versions of gels, Luna Moons, Shot Blox and Carbboom chews. They worked just fine, but it’s not all that pleasant to have to chew them up with a dry mouth while you are panting.
When our mama bear told us that using First Endurance products was part of our sponsorship deal I was a bit nervous. Celiac makes my stomach finicky to put it mildly. My first interaction with First Endurance was when I emailed Carole (our mama bear who is responsible for making our team, well, awesome) asking if the First Endurance product was gluten free. I didn’t get a response back from Carole, I got an email directly from Robert Kunz, the co-founder of First Endurance. He assured me all products are gluten free. Simply Awesome!
I decided to give liquid shot a try, assuming my husband would probably be the one to use it. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Liquid shot is not a gel. From the First Endurance website:
It’s called a liquid shot because it doesn’t contain gelling agents that can slow down absorption and digestion. Features include our exclusive 400-calorie supercharged endurance formula that boasts over 1500mg electrolytes, 1000mg amino acids…
Categories: Nutrition, Product Reviews
Tags: EFS Liquid Shot, first endurance, Half Ironman Nutrition Plan, Nutrition, Sports Nutrition, Training, Triathlon
Ultragen Review & Contest
Just returned from a nice spring break trip with the family to the Sarasota, FL area. A couple of good stories to tell, but I’ll save those for future posts. Today’s post is the long overdue product review and a contest!
It seems like a couple of months ago I placed my first big order with First Endurance. I busted the bank, and got one of just about everything on the menu. I’ve been enjoying EFS Drink. I also bought Pre Race and Optygen HP, but haven’t used them yet. I also bought a case of Liquid Shot – but each Liquid Shot packs in about 400 calories, and I haven’t done anything that requires that kind of nutrition yet this year. More to come on these products later on this spring. I have used Ultragen several times.
Ultragen is touted as the most advanced recovery drink. If you read the literature on First Endurance’s website, you’ll find tons of good information about the product (including how Ultragen gives you 320 calories, 60g of glucose, two types of proteins, and vitamins, minerals, glutamine and branch chain amino acids). More importantly, you’ll learn that Ultragen is a recovery drink intended to be used in the first 30 minutes following a tough workout. Here’s the rub…I think this stuff really tastes GREAT! I bought the cappuccino flavor, and damn…
Categories: Nutrition, Triathlons
Tags: Contest, first endurance, Nutrition, Tri-Swim, UltraGen
Celiac Sucks
On a day to day basis I am able to tell myself that there are things much worse than having celiac disease. In general I believe that my celiac diagnosis led me to some major positive lifestyle changes, and led my family to some very positive lifestyle changes. And then there are days like yesterday.
Mile 5 of the bike ride my waist band started to feel like it was digging into my belly. Hmm, that lunch I ate before the ride must not be sitting well. Mile 6 I couldn’t keep anywhere near my riding partner – try as I might. Mile 7 I was reduced to labor like breathing and had my tights pulled up to my ribs to try and lesson the discomfort of the waistband on my belly. My wonderfully patient riding partner suggested a break at mile 8 to walk around a bit. By then I knew it wasn’t the timing of my pre-ride lunch, rather what was in my pre-ride lunch. Somehow I got gluten – but for the life of me I still don’t know where.
So, what is celiac? It’s not a food allergy, rather an auto-immune disorder. From the Mayo clinic website:
Celiac disease is a digestive condition triggered by consumption of the protein gluten, which is found in bread, pasta, cookies, pizza crust and many other foods containing wheat, barley or rye. If you have celiac disease and eat foods…
Categories: Nutrition
Tags: celiac disease, gluten free, gluten intolerance
Drinking Games
Step 1-she said she knows her bike nutrition is poor (well, she said sucks), she runs out of steam and feels miserable. Acknowledging you have a “problem”-good step 1. She was miserable; she said the only guidance she had received was being told to read a book…not helpful
So, we discussed what she’s tried, calorie needs per hour and the like. She and I are of similar size and build, so it was easy to use myself as an example. I happily used the opportunity to share all I LOVE about First Endurance products-the taste, ease of use, positive results, enough electrolytes for GA heat and humidity….gave her some products to try…
She left feeling better and more confident and ready to try some new things. So, when she asked “when do I start drinking on the bike-after 1 1/2 hours?” I said “No!” I told her I use my bike computer not as much
…
Categories: Biking, Family & Friends, Nutrition
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