Pain

Today marks my first 60+ mile ride since sometime in 2002. – Yup, 60.67 miles of semi hilly, hot fun on La Machina. The temps today were moderate compared to yesterday’s inferno, but still damn hot. While I used to do 60-70 milers with some regularity when I lived in the Bay Area, this one was a bitch. The first 30ish miles weren’t bad since we had a mild tailwind and the temps were cool, but heading home – damn that was tough! My friend Joe, who did the ride with me, called the weather Houston hot (he should know, he grew up there).

As I sit, tired and a tad bit sore in my comfy chair in my air-conditioned office, blogging away, I am thankful for a few things:

• Home: Its air conditioned, contains food, water, a soft carpet/couch/bed to lie on, and is generally more hospitable to my body than a bike bouncing across bumpy rural roads.
• My comfy office chair. While my saddle is fairly comfortable, my cheeks are much happier in a chair that has more than 10 square inches of surface area..
• Air conditioning. Yup, its flipping nice not to be sweating my ass off out on some road in the middle of rural Kansas.
• Food. As much as I love Perpetumm, I like my wife’s flourless chocolate cookies better.
• My wifey: She makes said cookies and is concerned for my welfare when I’m out on the roads.
• My pooch. Cooper makes a great pillow. Ok, so I have to return the favor by letting him lick the salt off my legs, but hey, it’s a good compromise.

Next up: 65 miles. I get a reprieve next weekend since we’re on vacation, but let’s hope that the weather is nice for my next long ride.

A Little Upper Body Workout

According to every book I read, Triatletes are notorious for their disdain for weight training and upper body workouts. Guess what, I feel the same way – it just seems so mind numbingly boring. However, if you give me an activity to do that accomplishes the same goal, I’m all over it. Give me a cord of wood to chop, give me a basement to frame out or give me a slab of concrete to break up and I’m a happy camper.

This afternoon, I had one phenomenal upper body workout – I destroyed a 5” thick slab of concrete that used to be the walkway leading to the front door of the house. We’re not talking jackhammer or Bobcat here, we’re talking a 16 lb sledgehammer attached to 215 lbs of me. Ok, so it was 90+ degrees out and amazingly humid, but I was bored and my bike was in the shop and I needed something to keep me out of trouble. Besides, taking all of my pent up energy out on a poor defenseless slab of concrete was really fun.

The final score: Lurch 1, Concrete 0.

Ironman Kansas

So I went out to Lawrence on Sunday to watch the Ironman Kansas 70.3 tri. Two of my friends were doing the race: Rianman (aka Rian Sanders) and April Nooteboom. Both are veteran triatletes and role models to me in my quest to become an Ironman (or at least a half ironman). To put it bluntly, watching the race was, in two words, awe inspiring. Seeing the swim start as 2000 wetsuit clad triatletes entered Clinton Lake was an absolutely amazing sight; seeing them whiz by me on bikes that can cost more than some cars was a sight to behold and seeing them push through the pain to finish sooooo made me want to be out there.

Both Rian and April finished with great times. April in 6:24:29 and Rian in 5:56:50. It was April’s first half and Rian got a massive PR. Cutting 20+ minutes off a half is a massive achievement, especially in the conditions that they battled. While it was cool and crisp up until about 10am, once the clouds went away, it got incredibly hot and humid – not the kind of weather you want for any sort of race.

I have to share a few funny quotes from Rian that he uttered (or muttered) to me before, during and after the race. Mind you, he’s one of the nicest and most courteous guys I've ever met, so I’ll share some quotes (or at least paraphrased quotes from him)

• Prior to the swim start: (mind you his heat is already in the water and everyone is nervously awaiting the gun): “Marcus, I really hope you’re having fun. Hey, isn’t this cool? Look at…, Look at…, Look at…” Um, Rian, you’ve got a race starting in a minute…this is more about you than me. You might want to get in the water.
• Coming up a torturous hill when he’s clearly beginning to hit the wall and is beginning to slur his words. “Next tree…I’ll run. Branch (series of unrecognizable words)….run. Hey what time is it? Hey, how are you doing Marcus?” Rian, I hate to say it, but this race is about you…I’m doing just fine.
• At the end of the race after he seriously considered heading over to the medical tent: “Marcus, are you sure you want to do this crap? It hurts” Um…yes. And I’ll probably look a lot worse when I do it.
• After the race walking back to the car: When I offer to carry his 40lb bag of T1 and T2 stuff. “Hey, its ok, I can carry that.” Um, Rian, you just covered 70.3 miles and almost went to the medical tent – I’m sure I can carry your gear bag a mile.

Rian, sorry about the quips at your expense, but you were flipping hilarious out there and a massive inspiration to me. Congrats again on the massive PR.

April, you kicked some serious butt and looked great doing it. You’re a flipping inspiration to me!

The Bike

La Machina: (Italian: La Maa-Keen-Ah). Slang for an auto, bicycle or any other mechanical device that goes fast and transports something or someone from place to place.

My nickname for my bike is La Machina. Nope, it’s not a Pinarello, a Bianchi or any other piece of finely crafted Italian engineering. It wasn’t even built by a guy named Paulo or Guido. Realistically it was probably built by a guy named Bill in Waterloo, Wisconsin. Yup, it’s an American bike, with arguably some of the finest components on it – Campagnolo. The next time you see a post on my Facebook page lauding Tullio Campagnolo or talking about me having Campi powered fun, I’m referring to La Machina.

La Machina is a Trek 2200 road bike, vintage approx 1999. What’s really cool about it is that it’s a carbon fiber/aluminum hybrid. It’s incredibly light, stiff, but fairly forgiving on rough roads. With a 16 speed Italian transmission and a 220 lb Swiss engine, it moves quietly (well most days) and provides me with a really cool ride.

The bike has a really cool story: When I was looking for a bike back in 2001, I did a lot of shopping. Finding a bike for a dude that’s 6’3’ isn’t the easiest thing in the world - not a whole lot of variety and almost no end of season closeouts. Getting a 62 cm bike can sometimes even be a special order item. Translation: Expensive. Undeterred, I start checking the web. Not much luck here – I guess all the abnormally huge cyclists are holding onto their wheels. In desperation I put a post on Craigslist. Wanted: 62cm road bike, but be no older than 2 years old. Contact me with details” Of course I get a slew of responses of people trying to get rid of their kids Huffy or their dad’s 1975 schwinn Varsity, but in that mix I get a response from a lady in SF. “I’ve got a bike for you. It belonged to my cheating POS Ex. I want it out of my house”. I pay a visit to her and she pulls the bike of the closet. “He was 6’4”. Want to take it out for a ride?” I spy the bike, salivating, but trying not to let her see my drool. “Sure”. I take it for a spin around the block. “ Damn, nice bike!” Sure it could use a good dusting and a tune, but a sweet ride! I pull up to her on the sidewalk. “Like it?” She says. “Um, it is a nice bike, but it needs a lot of work”, I sheepishly say trying to begin the negotiation process. “Well do you want it? I just want to get all of his shit out of my house.” Yes – how much do you want for it? I don’t know – how about $300? I have no idea what its worth.” Feeling incredibly guilty I respond to her offer “How about this: I’ll give you $350 – those pedals on it are really nice.” DONE!. I give her the cash and hop in my truck with my steal in the bed. I drive off, looking in my rearview mirror halfway expecting to see some really pissed off dude wearing a towel from his mistress’ apartment chasing me down the street. Nope - No guy chasing me, but I made off like a bandit. Yup, I scored a $2500 bike for $350. I feel excellent and that bike is still with me today.

A Story Of Hills and a PR (Almost)

So this morning I ran the Hospital Hill half marathon here in KC. It’s billed as the second oldest half in the country and is reputedly one of the hilliest. Personally I think the latter is true. I’ve run both the San Francisco Half and Hospital Hill and HH is definitely the harder of the two.

Since today was my third time doing this race, I had no expectations whatsoever. Since my goal for this and next year is getting better at my tri’s, today was a formality (at least in my mind). I didn’t have any time goals – I just wanted to finish strong and have fun. I ended up running it with two of my Runners Edge training buddies – Amy Reed and Heather Mayfield. Amy had the same attitude as I and I think Heather had no desire to do it until I started talking about the race a few weeks back.

Ok, I’ll cut to the chase. We all KICKED some serious ASS today! Amy set a half marathon PR by 9 seconds, I missed a PR by a little more than a minute and Heather ran it just 9 minutes slower than her rocket fast time in Lincoln last month. Mind you, the HH is incredibly hilly and our previous PRs were on flat courses, so our accomplishments today are nothing short of amazing. So how did we all do so well?

• Conditions: Pretty much perfect. Temps in the 60’s with some nice winds.
• The Company: We all stayed together until about mile 8 and Heather and stayed together until about mile 12.5
• Pre race meal: I can’t speak for Heather and Amy, but I had a cheeseburger, fries and a Fat Tire at the Flea last night.

Whatever the reason, we did incredibly well!

So to Amy, Heather, the rest of my Runner’s Edge buddies and of course all of those who participated in the Hill – good job! You all kicked butt today and made our hometown race a huge success AGAIN!