First Freak Out

The other day I had my first Ironman freak out. It was bound to happen at some point but I didn’t expect it so early. Of course leave it to my subconscious to get a head start of things. The episode occurred in a dream the other night. The main subject matter of the dream was that I was in the transition area trying to get organized and I was missing half my stuff. The majority of the dream was me freaking out about where my stuff was and running back and forth trying to locate everything. Another weird part was that we were using repair stands to mount our bikes which was pretty funny when I look back at it.

During the course of the next year leading up to IM Wisconsin I’m sure these episodes will come and go. It’s kind of funny that they’ve started already. I think it is part of me wanting to be training full time again. I miss the schedules and the routines. I miss my team and coaching. I want to have my schedules laid out so I can see where I’m going. I’m just ready for the off season to be over with. I just want to the season to start again.

Oh well it will come soon enough and then I’m sure I’ll be complaining about it. Funny how you miss things like training and then once you are doing it you are oh yeah that what it’s like and you want a break. That’s just the nature of the beast. Come on Fido we’ve got work to do.

Who spiked the eggnog?

Before I depart for another holiday function I just wanted to wish each of you a very wonderful holiday season. Safe travels and good times wherever you may be during this time of the year. Take care…

Happy Holidays!

#1 gift to me, from me (and the bank)

As I alluded to yesterday, this past weekend I made the biggest purchase of my life. After months of procrastinating and looking I finally found what I was looking for. So here is my #1 Christmas present to myself…

My new ride!!

Now I’m pretty psyched about having a vehicle that is relatively new. I’ve never owned a vehicle that wasn’t close to, or over the 100,000 mile mark so having one that has less then 50,000 is super sweet. I’m not one to get all hyper about things like cars but I’m really excited to have a new ride. It’s not the best or the fanciest, it’s just new to me which is all I really need. I’ve always been a car guy so it will take a little getting use to having a SUV, even if it’s a small one. I figured that it was time to get a little bigger vehicle that will allow me to haul around all the gear that I’ve been collecting over the last couple of years.

So there you have it, the biggest Christmas present that I could come up with and it’s a doozie this year. Who wants a ride?

Apparently only Mouse and MinnesotaDon bought themselves things for Christmas this year. So to everyone else, who has read my last couple of posts, Go buy yourself something! :)

For Me? You shouldn’t have…

Throughout the holiday shopping spree that takes place ever year it’s hard not to pick up a thing of two just for you. This year was no different when I picked up a Polar S720i heart rate monitor. I still don’t know how to use all the functions, but I needed one for Ironman training next year anyway. So I figured I might as well go all out and get one that has a ton of features. The only things its really lacking is GPS, but I’m ok with that.
I did make one more big purchase for myself that needed to be made, but it just happens to fall right in the middle of the holidays so I’m going to think of it as another gift to myself. I’ll post more about that tomorrow. Where I was going will all this is that I want to know things have you bought just for you this holiday season? What things have you picked up on the notion that these are gifts for you from you? Let’s get a list going folks…

The Old Switcheroo

I might be one of the last ones, but I finally made the switch to the new version of Blogger. Hopefully this will take care of all the problems I’ve been having while trying to comment on people’s blogs lately. I guess we'll have to wait and see how good this new version is. Anyone have any thoughts on the new version?

Anyone, anyone, Bueller, Bueller...

On to the topic of the holidays which is rapidly approaching. Like many people I’m just wrapping up my shopping and as of today I think I’m done. Which is a nice feeling but there are still cards to send and presents to wrap. Actually I don’t think I’ll have to wrap any gifts as Kimmi and another TNTer are offering gift wrapping as a fundraiser. Now I have to hand it to these girls because that’s pretty creative. So unless something changes I will have escaped all stores and gift wrapping all together this year. Now that’s pretty sweet in my book.

I hope you all had a great weekend. Take care…

Online shopping is…

pretty much the best invention since sliced bread. I mean how else do people expect me to get my Christmas shopping done? I mean come on here folks I’m a fairly busy person and not the biggest fan of malls so doing my shopping online totally rocks. So far this year all my shopping has been done online and I hope to keep it that way. There might be a thing or two that I will have to go to the store for but I can manage that. What I can’t manage is being one of thousands of people out at the malls this coming weekend. No thanks I’ll be out running and everyone else can go fight for parking and the last item on the rack. That’s just not my vibe…

Mediocre

I think this is the best way to describe my swim last night. I’m still trying to get back into the swing of things in the pool and it always takes quite a bit of time for me. Last night it was just a case of trying to do too many things at once. Or I should say, trying to correct too many things at once. I should know better then, but sometimes you just have to struggle a bit til you remember how you should go about things. So I’m in the struggle phase to my reentry into the water. The plan is to go back tonight and try once again to get things right or at least a little better.

P.S. Would someone please teach my shoulders how to be flexible? :)

Unseasonably

I’d like to go ahead and thank global warming for the unseasonably warm weather pattern that passed through the Twin Cities this weekend. Actually I’d rather not thank global warming, but it was rather warm for December. Way to warm for my taste. Now unlike a lot of people I really like the winter. I like having piles of snow on the ground especially during the holidays. With the holidays quickly approaching Old Man Winter needs to get his act in gear cause we’ve got nothing, zilch, nada. So I’m sorry to rain on the nice weather parade, but bring on the snow. This is MN! Is it is suppose to be cold and snowy during the winter and it’s been nothing close to that so far. So please let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

The Weekend is Here!

Woohoo it’s Friday and that mean quitting time is almost here. Now I can’t say that it was a bad or very hard week working for the man, but the motivation just wasn’t there. This can make for a long week and I’m ready for it to be over.

With one week almost over another one will soon be starting and I’m hoping to be a little more proactive in my training next week. One of the things that I came away with from the coaching clinic was that you really don’t want to wait to start things in January, which was my plan. I figure if I can get in some quality workouts before the holiday break things will get off to a better start once the New Year comes around.

So wherever your plans are for the weekend I hope you have a great one. Take care folks…

Airbone to the Rescue

It might just be a freak occurrence but I think this Airbone stuff actually might have some benefit. The oncoming illness symptoms that I was feeling yesterday are gone. The little tickle in the throat and the like are no where to be found today. So for now I’ll jump on the Airbone bandwagon. I mean it can’t hurt can it?

A while ago I vented a bit about having to take the Water Safety Instructors (WSI) class. Looking more into things it is actually a class that teaches you how to be a better swim instructor. Great that should be useful during the upcoming season and it actually sounded like fun. Well it turns out that there has been a change of plans as the TNT staff is now asking us to take the Lifeguard course instead, which sounds like a lot more work and a lot less fun. Has anyone ever taken a Lifeguard course or was certified? Is it hard?

The whole ordeal has been a bit frustrating. All I want to do is coach, but there have been a lot of extra requirements to get there. So after I take the course in January I should have my third and final requirement out of the way. Best cross my fingers on that one and get my ass to the pool. :)

Picking up Steam

After returning from Cali on Monday I had a TNT meeting that night. The meeting was actually for the mentors, but the coaches were there to talk about expectations and other odds and ends. The other triathlon coach wasn’t going to be there so I went to the meeting to talk with our new crew of mentors. We have a good crew of mentors coming in, many were first timers last year, and it was good to see them again. After the staff was done with their portion of meeting I got up to address my mentors. I’m not the more gracious public speaker, outside of actual coaching and leading workouts, but I stumbled through my notes trying not to show my bit nervousness. You see I knew almost everyone in the room really well, but it’s different when I have to put on the coaches game face and tell them how things are going to be. Anyway it’s all a little strange, but I’m sure I’ll get use to it.

What’s exciting is that things are starting to get pick up momentum towards the upcoming season. Our informational meetings start next month, which again I have to speak at, blah and in less then 2 months we’ll be kicking off the 2007 season. Our goal is to have over 200 triathletes. Holy crap that’s a lot of people to coach, I guess I’m going to be very busy next year.

Total different topic…Have to folk tried the Airborne cold tablets? I just found out about these things on my way home from Cali. I was sitting at the bar when a lady asked for a glass of water and drops a tablet into it start fizzing. I didn’t think much of it until another person came by and did the same thing. I asked the 2nd lady what it was and she showed me the Airborne package. She’s was like these things are great. Now the cold and flu bugs have been going around lately. Ms. R even came down with one last night so I ran to the store and picked up some of these tablets. I’m going on the offensive to hopefully avoid getting sick, at least for now. I’ll let you know if they work at all, but it would be great to hear what other people things about these things.

That’s all from the brisk north where currently we are just trying to stay warm. Tonight it will be in the single digits. Oh well bring it on Old Man Winter, let’s see what you got! (P.S. could you please send some snow with these cold temps...Thanks OMW)

My Weekend in CA

From Saturday morning til Sunday evening, just about every hour of my weekend was scheduled in. Most of my weekend was spent in a conference room at the very nice Renaissance Club Sport in Walnut Creek, CA. The amenities were very nice, but I didn’t have time to use all the health club/spa facilities as I was there for TNT coaching certification clinic. As I mentioned before Dave Scott is the TNT head coach and was conducting the weekend and I have to say that he’s a really nice guy and a great coach. For all is fame is seemed very humble and actually somewhat camera shy. He came with a ton of information and great stories to boot. Most of our time was in the classroom with the exception of a running, bike fitting, swimming, stretching/strengthening activities session. We had a group of about 30 coaches and it was great clinic. It was really good to get to know some other coaches and hear about their programs.

Now being that I was in the SF area it would have travesty if I didn’t meet up with the Nic of Phase Five. After my clinic ended I headed into SF to meet Nic. One thing about SF, or at least the area where Nic lives, there is like zero parking. I spent about 20 minutes trying to find a parking spot and ended up 6 or 7 blocks away from her place. So we both set off from our locations and met at a Starbucks. First if you’ve read Nic’s blog you know what a great and wickedly cool person she is and meeting her was like the icing on the cake. She showed me around the area and we had a really good dinner at a little Italian joint. I have to say that I’m jealous that you can eat outdoors all year round in SF. We finished things off with some gelato and stroll down by the bay. I was only able to visit for a couple of hours but it was nice to see a little bit of SF while I was there.

After saying good-bye to Nic it was back to the airport to drop off the rental car and wait for my flight. I was taking the red-eye back which didn’t leave til 12:30 AM so I had a bit of wait. Finally after a flight full of cat naps I was back in chilly MN by 6:00 AM on Monday morning after one full, but great weekend in CA.

Coaching crew with Dave hiding in the back

California Dreaming

In a matter of hours I will be on flight head west to the great state of CA. It’s been a few years since I’ve been to the Golden State and I’m looking forward to going back. The main purpose of the trip is to get certified as a TNT triathlon coach. I’m a little nervous about this since I’m kind of in my off season and I’m not in the best shape right now to be going to a two day clinic involving lots of workouts and coaching fundamentals. It doesn’t help that the head coach for the program is Dave Scott “six-time Ironman World Champion and the first inductee into the Ironman Hall of Fame.” Holy crap peoples…Now you couldn’t ask for a better guy to learn from but his is huge! So I can’t say that I slept the best last night knowing what this weekend is going to involve.

Another highlight of the trip will be meeting up with the ubber fabulous Nic! She’s going to show me around SF and let me in on why it is “one of the best cities ever.” (Nic didn’t say that, but my guess is that she’d agree and I felt like something needed to be in quote)

Have a great weekend folks and I’ll catch up with you all on Monday. Cross your fingers that Dave Scott doesn’t kick my ass and says I’m ok to coach for TNT.

Later…