Glenn Gervais

Womens Hockey at the Winter Olympics

2010-02-14T09:05:00.000-08:00

What a truly great experience for us and the boys. We had the best time! It almost felt like we were Canadian for a day, eh.

We got up early to head to the Lynden border and could count the number of cars in front of us one one... finger! Very easy and felt arriving too early to my friends house to meet and pickup our tickets.

Omer and I got together a couple years ago and decided what was hopefully the best chance to see either Canada or USA women's hockey in downtown Vancouver. We entered and hit the Canadian Olympic lottery for tickets, 7 in total for Canada vs Slovakia on a weekend.

We drove around a bit and found a Tim Hortens to stop at for a bit before going to Omer's house. We finally met and visited for a bit. We headed out about an hour before Omer and family.

Traffic was non existent as we drove into a park and ride in Surrey and simply walked onto the Sky Train that arrived within minutes. They added extra trains and all day the free trains (with our tickets) were not too crowded and we never waited for than a couple minutes for the next train.

Downtown was a different story... Everywhere we walked (and we walked a lot) was crowded and lots of lines to get into the different celebration pavilions. They had different spots setup for each province and a big central LiveCenter. All had long lines.

We met Omer and family for lunch, we walked around Chinatown for 10-15 minutes looking for Dim Sum, but the three places Omer had in mind were all closed. Quite an experience for the kids walking past shop after shop with all sorts of unknown items and the smells of who knows what. We settled on a Chinese diner and ate lunch.

After lunch we walked around the seawall and through the larger Concord Place celebration area with multiple celebration pavilions. Across the water is the Athlete Village, neat to see all the flags.

We then got onto a train to take us to the waterfront to see the Olympic flame, the train was great, but we miss judged the distance from the train to the flame, longer walked than we planned and a lot more people than even the celebration pavilions. We couldn't get a good look at the flame, but we did see it. Kinda anti climatic after all the people we had to sift through to get our small glimpse.

Back on the train to the stadium area of downtown and got in line about 15-20 minutes before the security checkpoints opened to get into the stadium. My oh my, there must of been 20+ security checkpoints and each had a tremendous line. Once they opened it moved smoothly, Debbie had to get scanned with the wand though (her belt). We heard people later inside that they slowed down and some people were late arriving to the match.

We got in the stadium about 2 hours before face off and they had a big screen setup to watch other sports, we watched a bit of ski jumping before finding our seats. I thought these cheapest seats in the stadium were great, 1 row below the roof we could see the whole arena and good view of the center screen for replays and watching pre game videos of the opening ceremonies.

We walked around the stadium a bit and got souvenirs and ate before the game started. Alex got a bit bored before the third period, but everyone else had a blast right up to the final outcome. The place filled up and we felt a bit out of place, almost everyone was wearing Canadian colors, lots of red and white, and a ton of hockey jerseys. Good experience for first hockey game, lots of action, lots of scoring... Canada won 18 - 0!

Due to extra security they only had one exit area and was kinda tight to get out, like a herd of cattle just moo-ving slowly through a small gate.

Once again the Vancouver transit was awesome, as we got on a train without any wait and nice easy ride back to our car. Straight shot from the car down King George highway to the Blaine border and as we got to the border crossing we could again count the number of cars in line in front of us on one... finger! Yeah, best day ever for going across the border!

Not sure if we'll ever go to another Olympics, but this will leave lots a great memories for a lifetime.

Ironman Coeur d'Alene Race Report 2009

2009-06-25T18:30:00.000-07:00

I got to CDA on Wednesday and was able to get most all the pre race issues before Debbie, Jacob, Alex and my parents arrived on Friday night. Spent a great day on Saturday with the family and even had time to BBQ at our hotel with everyone and my Aunt and Uncle from Spokane.

PRE RACE MORNING

Up at 3:30 race morning, and ate two packages of oatmeal and a nice cup of coffee to help with... well, you know. We stayed only 2 miles away this time and even though such a short drive I left before 4 and got a screamin parking spot just across the street from transition so Debbie and the kids and parents could relax if needed during the day.

I was able to fill up my tires, drop off my bags, sleep some in the car, porta stops and basically get all ready and use the car as a base.

From Ironman CDA 2009

My parents picked up the family and caught a free shuttle and were able to meet up and walked to get a great spot to view the start. Got hugs and good wishes and made my way to the beach. ate a Gel and was feeling ready, saw Sean and his plan was to go inside the buoy line, my plan had me on the other side of the beach and 2500 people, so I went over there and waited, not nearly as nervous as in 2007. I also couldn't hear any announcements so when the cannon went off, just walked into the water and started swimming with just a few other people (2153 starters).

SWIM 1:32:13 (1680 out of 2153 overall) (262/313 M35-39)

Swim started out ok, but I really felt like this swim was worse than the almost canceled 2007 CDA swim. The rollers were bigger, but no whitecaps this time. I found it very hard to get into a groove and was constantly running over others or getting run into. I thought I swam some what straight but clearly not my best swim. first lap took longer than expected and I knew a PR would be very tough. Got a cramp in one calf on the way back out, but was able to quickly stretch and get back to swimming in under 20 seconds. Much less traffic on second lap, but still ran into a lot of people zig zagging around the course. I warmed up the water as I got closer to the exit and was pretty well ready to be done swimming for a while.

From Ironman CDA 2009

I was in 1680 position coming out of the water.

T1 5:21

I saw Debbie and my parents as I ran up the beach and that pumped me up! I was happy that they have wetsuit peelers so I didn't have to get out of that on my own. Transition tent was packed so I got ready out side and was off onto the bike pretty quickly. Seeing the family again as I got to my bike was awesome, each time my smile got bigger and eyes got wetter and I got faster.

BIKE 6:39:19 16.8 MPH (1332 out of 2097 overall) (245/313 M35-39)

I planned all year on using my power meter to monitor my wattage output and keep things under a certain amount to save energy for the run so I started slow on the initial out and back along the lake. I noticed it was tough into the wind and got pretty fast with the wind even though I was under my goal wattage. One hill on this section that you ride up and over each way. On the way out you go up this hill and half way up is a band of bagpipers and just past them is a huge inflatable sun smiling at you, then a bunch of cheerleaders just over the crest finally followed by some Scottish dancers kicking their feet up on our way down the other side. The crowds, the volunteers and seeing the family each lap really make this a great race.

Very uneventful section and very quickly made my way back into town and headed north with the wind, what a nice push, if I watched the MPH I thought I was going to hard, but the wattage told me different and kept a nice easy pace going 20+. I knew what was looming though, we don't really hit the hills until we get to Hayden Lake and come they did.

I tried my best, but my wattage still went over my limit on each hill and was passed on each and every hill on course, but the power meter also told me when I crested the hill and could start peddling harder and I passed many many who had passed me on the crest even before we started back down the other side of these hills. I had a bit of pain in one leg and was worried that I would cramp up like I did on of my last training rides, but the cramp never materialized.

Coming back into town into the wind was a bit tougher, but saw Daryl (my coach) and got pumped up and then as you get even closer into the core the crowds grow and grow and just made me smile even more. I really enjoy the crowds and think this is one reason I really like this venue. Saw Debbie before short 1 mile out and back so knew I'd see her again riding past transition and I think I rode very fast and hard on this section but I figured 2 hard miles over wattage wouldn't blow my day and wanted to hear the cheering again.

From Ironman CDA 2009

Past transition and loud cheers from Debbie (My parents took the kids to a movie so everyone had a great day!) then ride 6 blocks through town with crowds on both sides of the road just pumping up even more.

Time to repeat the lap, I made a quick stop at the furthest turn around by the lake to grab new bottles of perpetuem and was quickly underway again. heard Debbie cheering again as I passed transition and got nice push as I headed back north towards Hayden Lake. I needed to make a quick porta stop at the first aid station and they even have volunteers to hold your bike whilst you do your business so I got going quickly after continuing North. Again seeing Coach Daryl out there was great and then the hills. I was getting pretty tired by this point and really felt like not biking, but kept pushing on, standing a bit more on the second lap hills and getting out of the saddle, even the downhills were not as fun.

About mile 95 I needed to get off the bike, so just past that aid station I got off and walked the bike for 3 or 4 telephone poles to stretch and use different muscles. I really think this helped with the final push into the wind back to downtown, as once I was riding again, I must of passed another 40-50 people before hitting transition VERY happy to get off the bike and hand it to a volunteer to rack for me.

I had a GU every 30-45 minutes and drank my perpetuem and went through most all I planned, also downing 2 salt tabs every hour or so as well.

I'm sure I passed some in T1, but passed 318 moving up to 1362nd position overall

T2 4:44

Off the bike, before getting my run gear I made my way into a porta john and got some relief and after grabbing gear from another volunteer found an empty chair inside the tent. Nice to sit, but I had work to do so worked quickly to change shoes and that was pretty much it, ran in the same bike clothes.

RUN 4:06:16 9:24/Mile (478 out of 2032 finishers) (90/313 M35-39)

I had my GPS and was able to pace myself out of transition and keep it easy for the first section of the run. I had planned on walking the aid stations and thought the first aid station came pretty quickly, but stuck to my plan and walked through the aid station from one end to the other. Once through I started running again out to the turn around and back to the same transition, again I walked and again thought it was too soon to be walking but stuck to it.

The next aid station is way on the other side of town and more than 1 mile and was further than expected before I was able to walk and truly was looking forward to this 3rd walk, but running through the throng of people downtown made up for any slowing, what a rush to run through thousands of people cheering your name (because it is on each bib with your number)!

After some twists and turns through town, we run along the lake and right into a headwind and rain. I was slowing and very much wanting to walk, but again stuck to it and made it to each aid station without any walking in between meeting one of my goals. The furthest out aid station is within half a mile of the turn around and I walked it each way even though so short of run section in between.

Running back into town with the wind was uneventful and seemed to just pass away. I hit the midway point at 2:04 on my watch and saw my family just past the transition area and got some high fives and high energy from them. Jacob ran along with me for 100 yards or so! What a great spot they had, because I only had the short .8 mile out and back to get to see them again.

From Ironman CDA 2009

Once again more high fives and energy to keep me going. I needed that, the long section without an aid was looming and I was in a tough spot. I mentally took inventory and kept saying if I can make this section running I could then make the 'easy' one mile sections after that. I started taking the cola and chicken broth on this second lap for additional kick.

I made it and the next couple sections were very tough mentally to keep it running, the headwind on the way out again was tough, but really once I hit the furthest turn around I had the wind and the knowledge that I didn't have to come back out there again so just started cruzin.

I still walked the aid stations, but the final 4-5 miles were my fastest miles on the day and just flying past a ton of runners, what a feeling, to be able to run in the 7 minute range and just fly. Checking the watch I knew I was going to break my 13 hour goal and was looking like I was not going to make my sub 4 marathon. I still kept it strong and with a smile all the way to the finish.

I thought about not walking the final aid, but did walk it and the final mile or so was packed full of fans and the final 7 blocks is downhill past 2-3000 people cheering and pumping you up you cannot help but run fast. I was in a zone by now and just floating down the tunnel of people passing more people. Got high fives from the family near the finish chute and was moving so fast that the camera missed me, empty frame on the pic. so fast that I didn't realize the couple of finishers in front of me screwing up my finish pics :) What a great race, I truly love the fan support, the volunteers, the multiple laps to see the family, the organizers really do a top notch job of running this whole event.

I passed almost 500 (480) and negative split the marathon to finish in 882nd spot out of 2032 official finishers!

AFTER

My volunteer finish catcher walked me through all the finish line stuff and escorted me to the athlete corral and handed me to a medical volunteer who asked me some good questions and I knew I needed to get my feet up or else my calves would fully lock up so he took me into the medical tent and I sat with my feet up wrapped head to toe in space blankets and ice on my calves shivering like crazy, but never fully admitted to the area where the docs are, so not officially a medical tent occurrence, but just getting out of the rain. I sat for about 45 minutes while Debbie, coach Daryl and maybe others didn't know where I was, but was able to walk out on my own and found Debbie and made it to the car with the bike and easy 5 minute drive to the hotel.

Debbie went and got me some Epsom salts and a burger. I knew I wanted to soak and that I would be starving about 3 am. I soaked up some magnesium salts and two bites from the burger (still not wanting solid food at this point) I was in bed and then like clockwork, up about 3 am and polished of the Red Robin monster burger. so tasty at 3 am!

More than a 45 minute PR! I'll be back again for more Ironman, but again will give it a year off of this distance to fully recover and mentally be ready. Another 45 would get me well under 12... too early to think about that? naw, keep your eye on the prize!

OVERALL
12:27:51
882 out of 2032 finishers!
173 out of 313 M35-39!

Vacation and race pics here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/IronmanCDA2009?feat=directlink

Ironman Coeur d'Alene in 11 days!

2009-06-10T21:17:00.001-07:00

Bib numbers were announced and just wanted you to know that my bib number this year is 1033

You can watch the live online video feed on Sunday June 21 as well as look up my live results as the day progresses all from www.ironman.com

Finally a blog update

2009-06-07T12:23:00.000-07:00

It has been quite a while since I've posted to the blog so thought I'd let those still looking that I'm still training and getting ready for Ironman in Coeur d'Alene on June 21. Just finished my last long bike ride yesterday, 111 miles. I was really thinking about riding around the block to get to the 112 but one of my legs was cramping so bad that I had to one leg pedal downhill while I rested/stretched the cramping leg.

I haven't posted to the blog because I find it much easier to post a small blurb on Facebook or Twitter. feel free to add me as a friend on Facebook or follow me on Twitter

The Ironman is a 2.4 mile swim followed by 112 miles on the bike finishing with a 26.2 mile run (marathon). Sunday, June 21 will be my second Ironman triathlon and you can watch me live online on Ironman.com. You can also look up my name and results as I cross timing matts out on course.

Best times to watch will be from 6:45 am to about 7:15 am when the cannon goes off and all 2600 athletes jump into the lake at the same time. A mass start with this many triathletes is very exciting. They have the live video all day, but winners will finish around 3-4 pm and I hope to finish before nightfall (lucky for me it is the longest day of the year).

Also, very inspiring to watch the later times as athletes will continue to cross the line up until the midnight cutoff, some of these competitors are in their 70's and 80's and finishing up a 17 hour day of exercise. I hope to be competing (or at least participating) when I'm in my 70's and 80's...

Kauai Family Vacation

2009-02-24T19:01:00.000-08:00

We had a great time in Kauai hiking, kayaking, swimming, snorkeling, boogie boarding, spending time on the beach, at the pool all over the island! We went as far North as the road goes to Ke'e Beach and Kalalua trail head on the Napilli Coast and within miles of the end of the road to the South when we drove up the Waimea Canyon.

Starting up the Kalalau Trail

Wailea River

Secret Falls

Ke'e Beach

Kalapaki Beach

Alex hiding from the paparazzi

More (but still a small selection of the 400+) of our favorite photos are on our Picasa web album here.

2 weeks, 2 hikes, 2 times the fun!

2009-01-24T15:07:00.000-08:00

Last week we all went for a hike up the Pacific Northwest Trail (PNT) along Chukcanut Drive to hopefully make it to the Bat Caves, but we started out too late to make it that far. We made good time and did get up high enough to enjoy the view, sat at the bench someone lugged up there for a while and headed back down, great sunny warm January day!

Today we rented snowshoes and drove to Mt Baker. Parking lot was dry concrete so we got all suited up and walked over to the edge of the snow, got our snow shoes on and headed out for another sunny hike. Alex was not enjoying the snow shoe hike as much as the trail hike to the caves, so he and Debbie turned around about 30 minutes into the hike. Jacob and I continued on, but not too far, we went to the base of Table Top Mountain. Everyone had more fun on the deeper snow rather than the cat track we were using to get up higher originally. We all met up at the car and home safe. I think we all had fun, but in different ways.

2008 year in pictures!

2009-01-02T15:20:00.000-08:00

It goes so fast, but all these pictures and more bring back such great memories, I say let's do it again in 2009.

Hunting for Eagles in January

From Gervais2008

Manning Park vacation in February

From Gervais2008

Bike to School and Work Day in May

From Gervais2008

Jacob and Alex Ice Sculpting

From Gervais2008

Escape From Alcatraz Vacation in June

From Gervais2008

Glenn Escaped

From Gervais2008

Jacob Clear Lake Triathlon in July

From Gervais2008

Cannon Beach vacation in July

From Gervais2008

Renee and Chris Wedding!

From Gervais2008

Family Camping in August

From Gervais2008

Halloween!

From Gervais2008

Camping in NOVEMBER!

From Gervais2008

Tons of Snow in December

From Gervais2008

Enjoy these, but be sure to check out all the best of the family pictures on our web album at http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/Gervais2008. If you want to print any of these, you can download from our web album, if that is not a large enough resolution for you, please email me and I can get you the original(s). Happy New Year! and here's to a great 2009!

One horse open sleigh

2008-12-18T18:43:00.000-08:00

We left for a walk in the snow up and over the hill to Haggens about 3:30 in daylight and after some dinner and lite shopping we started back in the dark about 5:30 and got home an hour later. I pulled one or two kids at a time and got a great workout.

Mountain biking in the snow!

2008-12-14T18:11:00.000-08:00

Note: Additional Pics on Mike's blog

The snow started about 6 pm last night and only came down for a few hours, just enough to allow some mountain biking but deep enough (up higher on Galbraith) to make it tough but still fun.

I took off about 8:10 to meet Mike and John at the Whatcom Falls tennis courts who had left from their side of Bellingham at 8. I got there a bit too early and kept circling the round about just to keep moving and warm. It was 22 degrees when we started out. (25 when I got home 3 and a half hours later).

Finally headed up Galbraith and instantly knew it was going to be a long tough haul, just riding up the switchbacks of the Miranda trail had us walking. yup walking up the lowest trail. We'd stop and regroup every now and again and at our first stop I couldn't drink out of one of my water bottles already frozen up. Once up a bit higher we decided to stick more to the logging roads, but that was still tough as that was where most the snow was and 5 or 6 inches deep to keep you on your toes or else you'd slip out pretty easily.

Made it to the kiosk and rested a bit then off to Cedar Dust and Rock n Roll before riding the pipeline road all the way to Samish Way. We laid the first tracks on Rock n Roll and Pipeline, a bit tough on RnR but the powder was flying on Pipeline. We continued out the other side of Galbraith onto some upper trails of Lake Padden before riding half way around the lake to a trail that took us to Fairhaven and the Taylor dock and the waterfront trail with a fierce headwind all the way into downtown Bellingham.

The guys headed back towards their places and I road through an alley and finally weaved my way to the Railroad trail back up to Lake Whatcom and home and a nice warm cup of Hot Chocolate. I wonder how Debbie knew to have the water already boiling, perfect timing. (The kids had just come in).

Truly a great ride with friends on some of the best trails Bellingham has to offer on such a beautiful day!

BMX racing!

2008-12-06T12:41:00.000-08:00

We spent a couple extra days after Thanksgiving at the grandparents so Jacob could try BMX racing at the track in Sumner. They race year round rain or shine at Riverside Park organized by River Valley BMX.

We went out to check out the park on Friday and to give Jacob a chance to ride the track with his 16" 'mini bike' as he calls it and Grandpa's 20" BMX bike. He was faster by quite a lot on the real BMX bike and we spent some time after getting back to the Grandparents to take off the reflectors, chain guard and other stuff they don't allow on the track when racing. Alex had fun running around the track and would 'race' Jacob on foot and he'd cut the course and win every time. I think they both had a great time.

Saturday morning we had a big breakfast and got to the track around 10 for sign ups and allow Jacob some more practice time on Grandpa's bicycle. We got there about 45 minutes too early. Sign up is from 10 to 11 and we had too much time to wait around for them to get everyone registered and announce the moto's. Jacobs cousin Johnathan came and signed up too, so we got some good visiting in while they warmed up. I think Sophia was thinking about trying it after seeing all the other girls who signed up.

Jacob was in Moto 11 and Johnathan in Moto 13. They put kids together based on age and classification. Jacob is 9 and a Novice, but there were not enough 9 year old Novices so they bumped him to the next group and was in the 10 Novice moto. Two nine year olds and one ten year old made up his Moto. Each moto races 3 times at this track gaining points for each race (1st, 2nd, 3rd...) and the one with lowest points after all three races is the winner. Jacob was very excited and convinced he was going to win his moto because the other two in his moto were girls. His first race proved it was going to be tough. He raced hard but finished third. Here is the video:

His second moto was a little better, I think he paced himself a bit better and was up in second place only to get passed in the last rhythm section. Third race he finished second and was very excited about that. One of the girls crashed, but he was just as excited about finishing second.

With three kids in a moto, they give trophies to the top two, but Jacob and Johnathan were not going to go home empty handed... First time racers get an award just for racing. Jacob and Johnathan waited and were called up and got trophies that were almost taller than Alex.

Done in less than 2 hours and everyone had a great time. Grandpa filled the kids up with sugar from the concession stand and it didn't rain, so all in all a great day at the races! I'm sure Jacob will try the races in Mount Vernon next summer. He is saving anything and everything to get a BMX bike for himself. Even selling some of his old video games.

Camping at Cama Beach

2008-11-11T11:22:00.000-08:00

Camping in the northwest (for me) has always been limited to June, July or August, mostly July and August, but we just got back from a couple nights at Cama Beach state park on Camano Island about half way between Seattle and Bellingham.

Camping may be a bit generous as we stayed in heated cabins complete with refrigerator and microwave. Cama Beach is a historic site and no cars are allowed down at the cabins, so we unloaded and waited for the shuttle. Debbie and the kids walked down the trail while I waited and waited. Not the best first impression, but as it turned out, the worst part of the trip and all in all not too bad.

Once in our cabin we explored the area a bit and had a Gervais family traditional first day of camping dinner of cold shake-n-bake chicken that Debbie made earlier. After dinner we had the best family game night I can remember in a while, probably due to no TV, no Internet, no outdoor lights, just stayed in the warm cabin and played some games.

Expecting rainy weather, we had a great sunny day on Monday and hiked up to Cranberry Lake and spent lots of time outdoors playing horseshoes, soccer, reading out in the sun and exploring the beach. We also drove over to Camano Island State Park and explored the campground and checked out the beach.

After homemade chicken noodle soup for dinner we settled down, played a little chess, later the kids drew pictures and Debbie and I read books, a nice quiet evening.

Pretty much woke up Tuesday morning, had breakfast and packed and loaded. Stopped at the skate park and Starbucks in Stanwood and home in about an hour after leaving the park. Close, easy and very pleasant camping in the deep deep winter, OK just mid November, but close enough to mid winter for this summer camper.

Lake Samish Triathlon

2008-09-13T07:12:00.000-07:00

Man it has been way too long since I last blogged. I am way behind on this race report. The Lake Samish Tri was way back on August 16th (over a month ago)

I almost did not go to this race because the kids were gone at the grandparents for the weekend and Debbie and I were renting a nailer to install hardwood floors in all three bedrooms including the stairs, hallway and closets. If not already paid and signed up I wouldn't of gone, but I was, so I did and I had a blast!

Great sunny day and got there early and was able to visit and catch up with friends before the race. Pretty good turnout for a first time event.

Ended up being a mass start for the sprint and a second wave for the tri-a-tri folks. They blasted the horn and we were off for a swim on some glassy smooth water at the north end of Lake Samish from Camp Lutherwood, no wind, very nice. I think it was a bit longer than the half mile quoted, but everyone had to swim the same course so no big deal.

Out of the water and into transition I had my wetsuit mostly off by the time I got to my bike and was pretty quick through. They changed the mount line due to all the gravel and glad they did.

Bike was two laps around Lake Samish, but in the opposite way that most riders ride the lake, which made it a bit more interesting and I think a bit faster, or at least it felt that way. I was picking off the faster swimmers and wasn't passed until on my second lap, so felt good about that.

Camp Lutherwood is not on the 'loop' around the lake, but a little spur which we had to ride both ways and felt fast coming back into the camp. Off the bike at the edge of the gravel and long run back to transition, but again was pretty quick to get out of bike shoes and the running one on and gone.

They adjusted the run to include this lovely little hill to avoid runners/bikers on same narrow section of road leading into the camp. This was no little hill, I ran this as part of the North Face Endurance Challenge and was still just as challenging, but once up and over and back on the Roy road it is pretty flat following the lake for a 5k out and back.

Coming back they made it a true out and back and made us run up and over the hill again. I ran the whole way and right at the top the guy in front of me, who walked most the hill, started running again just as I was about to overtake him. With less then a quarter mile left I was able to run smoothly over the top and get some speed down and pick it up and passed him before we finished.

Once done, I gathered my stuff and left quickly because I knew what was coming, laying some wood. Debbie and I laid wood from about 1pm - 9pm on Saturday and had enough energy to lay some more on Sunday, we went all day from 9am to about 9pm. It was very nice that the kids were gone at the grandparents for the weekend. We got 95% of the floors down over the weekend. I just had to finish the stuff close to the walls that the nailer couldn't fit into by hand over the next few days. The floors look great and am just now finishing up the final finish/trim painting. almost done.

XTerra Vashon Island

2008-07-29T10:58:00.001-07:00

My first XTerra (off road) triathlon was a couple weeks ago on Vashon Island and I truly enjoyed the experience.

We left a day early and stopped at the Clear Lake Triathlon for Jacobs third try at this race and he improved again finishing under 20 minutes!

After, we continued south to spend the day with my Grandma and took her a surprise lunch in honor of her 91st birthday and then spent the night at my parents. We all got up early Sunday morning and were off to catch the 6 am ferry to Vashon Island so I could pre ride the course to check for dangerous sections, roots, logs, rocks, sections where I could pass and spots to conserve a bit of energy.

We were second in line for the ferry behind other Bellingham triathletes (Tjalling and Dan) headed over for the same pre ride. It was great to be able to pre ride with these experienced XTerra studs (both have raced at XTerra world championships in Maui).

The guys at BuDu Racing were still setting up when we arrived, so we went out for our pre-ride before registering. Lots of the tape marking the course had been cut down so we took our time and reset what we could and I think pre riding helped me out during the race.

We got registered and walked down to the starting dock and given the course description and I almost had to laugh... Swim out and around this red sailboat over there and then head to the green one over towards the other side of the marina. trouble was there were three green sailboats to choose from. we got it all settled out and I, being a slower swimmer, was just following the swimmers in front of me so not too worried. and we were off, nice salty water (ug!) but only about half a mile so not too long and was out of the water in under 15 minutes and up the football field of mud at low tide (made for a shorter swim and was actually runnable and not too mucky)

I don't have click style pedals for my mountain bikes and just wore my running shoes for the bike and run. I got quickly onto my bike and was off out the parking lot and a very short section of road and right onto a tough, sandy, steep up hill section that I had to get off and push my bike, and being a race wanted to run while pushing and I was very soon huffing and puffing and pretty much red lined on top end of my HR.

Once up the course has less up and down and lots of winding single track which made it hard to know where other competitors were, but I just tried to keep on pushing myself and kept up some speed. We do this lap twice and it was easier the 3rd time (counting pre ride) and never crashed but did get banged and scratched up from how narrow the single track was with all the bushes and stuff. Great fun!

The final half mile or so of the bike course is on paved roads and mostly downhill so it made for a nice fast ride back into transition and since I already had my running shoes on, I had a very quick T2 and was off running.

Coming right out of transition is a steep hill that you must go up and across the road for a short on road uphill then onto a trail that, you guessed it, continues uphill, but once up was back on windy, up and down single track and again not knowing where other runners are kinda makes you run scared. There is a long paved road (maybe 3/4 mile) in the middle of the run that I was able to open up a bit more and then after is the flying descent back to the finish line right at the bottom of the same steep hill you went up to start.

All in all, I had a great time and enjoyed the event and course. BuDu has always put on a great event in my opinion.

I gathered up my stuff quickly as we were trying to catch a quick ferry off the south side of the island for the start of our trip to the Oregon coast staying at Cannon Beach. We made a couple wrong turns and when we got to the ferry dock, the ferry was just offshore headed over to Pt Defiance in Tacoma, so we got an extended rest waiting, but then were off the Debbie's parents for a shower, drop off the bikes, some lunch and quick visit then down to Oregon. Check out our trip pictures here.

Lake Padden Triathlon 2008

2008-07-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

This was my second run at the competitive version of the Lake Padden Triathlon and was hoping to improve on my previous time from 2006. Last year I was at a little race over in Coeur d'Alene 8-)

Got up early and drove to the park and got the closest parking spot one could get and then rather than just sit and veg I decided to jump out and help Lance and his crew setup transition. It was fun setting up the racks and then being able to set my bike at the premier spot (first row closest to bike exit).

As more and more people started to show up I stopped helping and was able to visit with friends and before long was in my wetsuit and down at the beach for a short warm up. We all got out of the water for pre race messages and then the first wave went off. I was able to get into the second wave and we went off about 3 minutes after the first.

Got into a nice groove and actually swam pretty straight. Hit the turn around buoy with lots of other swimmers still around me, so felt good about keeping pace. Way back to the beach it was definitely thinning out, but still enough to help keep me swimming straight. Hit the beach at 14:32!

Run up the grass hill and into transition and saw Debbie and the kids, they found the cattle bells and were ringing them for me, awesome. Real quick transition and off up the steep driveway out of the park and onto Lake Samish road.

The bike course is pretty hilly, but all that goes up must go down, so we get lots of downhills too. But first we must climb up and out of the Lake Padden area up towards the parking lot people use at the bottom of Galbraith. I was trying to keep a good pace, but this first hill is always tough on me and got passed by a couple riders, but was able to keep them close and on the long downhill into the lap around Lake Samish passed them back.

Kept a good pace around the lake and then back up that long downhill towards Lake Padden, but we turn at the freeway and go onto Old Lake Samish road that is generally downhill towards Chuckanut Drive. I like this section as you can really hammer it and get back some time.

Once on Chuckanut it is uphill again but it is short and get to come right back down the other side into Fairhaven and then we turn towards the freeway and the climb kinda starts before the freeway but once under it really turns up and this short 3 block climb is tough and pretty much straight up, but once at the top you come out onto Lake Samish drive and just another mile or so back to the park.

My bike split of 1:02:20 (20.2 MPH) was 3 minutes faster than 2006, woohoo!

Quick transition and off to run around the lake twice. This part is always tough to run past the finish for your second lap. The finish is right there but you cannot use it, must run around again.

I was running at a pretty good pace and it felt like I ran at a consistent pace not slowing too much. Each lap was within 30 seconds of each other. I was able to run the finish with Jacob and Alex and stopped the clock at 1:58:06 44Th out of 256 overall and 9Th out of 29 in my age group (M35-39). I was VERY happy to improve by 4 minutes on my 2006 time!

Great photo by Brunk Photo

Inmate 631 Escaped from Alcatraz

2008-06-09T19:17:00.001-07:00

SAN FRANCISCO - Inmate number 631 Glenn Gervais (AKA GGTriGuy) escaped from the ROCK also known as Alcatraz on Sunday June 8, 2008. After an early morning wake up call at 4:15 he was seen riding his bicycle from his cozy hotel room to the Marina Green near the San Francisco waterfront. Glenn dropped off his bicycle and left behind a Scooby Doo towel, helmet, sunglasses and shoes for bicycling and running but quickly left for his get away vehicle, a large tour bus.

John an Ironman athlete from Wisconsin was seen talking to Glenn on the bus ride to Pier 3 but did not apprehend our triathlete. Unable to verify, but we think Glenn was among 1800 people in wetsuits boarding the San Francisco Belle, a 292-foot stern wheeler two hours later just before 7 am. The cruise ship departed at 7:15 sharp before we were able to board to take Glenn into custody. The San Francisco Belle returned empty and we think Glenn jumped ship near Alcatraz Island and swam 1.5 miles to shore.

Glenn was seen exiting the water at St Francis Yacht Club by his Brother, Wife, kids and about 2000 other spectators but no one grabbed him. Glenn took off his wetsuit but left the Blue Seventy swim socks on and ran about half a mile before finding the bicycle and gear that he left behind hours earlier. He was too fast and was already gone on the bicycle before we could stop him for questioning.

There were over 1800 athletes and 20,000+ spectators so we could not follow Glenn out onto the bicycle course, but we believe he conquered the out and back hilly San Francisco course that went up and down through the Presido and out the other side and down to the Great Highway before turning into the Golden Gate park. Glenn's family saw him returning to the bicycle parking lot and caught him waving, so we know he really enjoyed the bike course.

After another quick stop to change his shoes Glenn was back on course, this time running. The sun was really beating down on all the athletes as they ran out towards the Golden gate bridge along the waterfront, only to find some stairs that took them oh so close to the bridge deck but just eluded capture by running under the bridge and through a battlement and some trails at Fort Point before running on the street out to a trail that took the athletes down to Baker Beach.

The athletes were seen running south to the end of Baker Beach before turning north to run to the other side where Glenn was seen at the bottom of the infamous 400 step sand ladder by an 11 year old athlete from Florida as she passed him and quickly beat him to the top.

Once tackling the sand ladder Glenn was rewarded with Clif Bloks before running back the same course to get back to the Marina Green where we finally caught Glenn as he crossed the finish line and officially Escaped from Alcatraz!

Once Glenn slowed down we were able to interview him and it is true, he did escape from Alcatraz along with about 1600 other triathletes. 1259Th out of the water he passed quite a few on the bike and run to finish in 595Th place. Plug in inmate (bib) number 631 here for complete results.

What a great race, What a great event! The weather turned out perfect, no fog, the ebb tide pushed us in the right direction. I used the pre race advice and sighted properly and came out on the correct beach. Hearing Debbie, Joe and everyone cheering for me gave me a great big smile and pumped me up even more. With so many people, the only thing I can compare to is the Ironman in Coeur d'Alene. Both races were put on by different organizations, but both were perfectly run and very well run. I highly recommend doing this event. I will do it again some day.

My Picasa photo album of the event is here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/EscapeFromAlcatraz

My Picasa photo album of our GREAT vacation is here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/SanFranciscoVacation

Off to Alcatraz

2008-06-03T15:02:00.000-07:00

Well we are on our way for a great week of fun ending with a Triathlon where I will swim 1.5 miles from Alcatraz to downtown San Francisco followed by a nice 1 mile warm up run to find my bicycle amongst the 2000 bikes for a hilly 18 mile ride finally finishing with a short 8 mile run including the famous sand ladder up from Baker Beach! WOOO HOOOO!!!

Hopefully you can track my progress online at: http://triathlon.accenture.com/SanFrancisco/

While your waiting for me to finish, head over to the B-Fit BDay site where I did a birthday Triathlon on my birthday. Since I turned 38, I swam the 3 miles, biked 38 and ran 8 miles in about 5 hours or so on my birthday to complete the GOLD challenge. Please vote for me (GG Iron Guy) and I might win a prize!

Voting is along the left side of the screen: http://www.bfitbday.com

Check back next week for a race report and photos from Alcatraz!!!

Ski to Sea

2008-05-26T20:00:00.000-07:00

The Ski to Sea race this year was quite different. With all the snow we had this winter and a recent heat wave, the river was flowing high and fast and as of late Saturday night the full race was planned to be run. After an early morning evaluation, the race director decided to cancel the canoe leg of the event. While there were lots of disappointed racers this was the best decision due to the high water there were no beaches to allow for self rescue. The exit beach (at the mountain bike leg start) was 6 feet under fast moving water, there was no place for them to exit the river.

So onto my leg the mountain bike... How to keep the race on schedule and allow for proper spacing and finishing in Fairhaven. They gave each canoe leg the same 2 hour time and tried to have the mountain bikers leave 2 hours after their road biker finished 18 miles away in Everson. it was quite hectic, but at least it wasn't raining. Actually it was hot and we heard at least 4 bike tires explode!

They did pretty good with the 2 hour window with the front runners, but then moved to about 5 riders at time about 3-4 minutes apart, then about 10 at a time, finally they gave up and just started calling numbers.

I rode my bike out to Hovander for the pre race meeting and then to wait... and wait... about 3-4 hours after arriving I finally got underway during the call out of numbers. I started out quick and kept passing riders that went out ahead of me, it was nice to have all these riders up ahead to give me targets to chase and catch.

This is a flat and fast course, only one small actual section of mud and more than half is on the road, so road with my slick tires pumped way up and tried to ride low and aerodynamic as possible. I caught more on the road and was only passed by one person, but I was able to catch his wheel and draft for a bit and then passed him back to have him pass me again, this time he got away but not too far and I finally caught back just as we got to the beach section, where you don't ride, but run with your bike and I just ran past him and never saw him again.

After the beach it is more road and into the park to Zuanich park at the finish to hand off to the kayaker. I needed to pass two more to get an even count and I had them in my sights and made the final pass after the final turn in the last 150 yards of the ride. Passed the line and passed the timing chip onto Jim.

I had a great ride, passed 40 riders and was 59th fastest overall (out of about 420 teams) and 11th fastest in the rec open category. Debbie and kids came to the finish and got some great pics. After a shower we went to Jims for a post race party and the whole team made it and exchanged food, drinks and stories of the day. All in all a great day.

THAT was a challenge

2008-05-11T09:09:00.001-07:00

I did the North Face Endurance Challenge yesterday and was one of the toughest, hardest and slowest half marathons I think I'll ever do. The held the event at Camp Lutherwood on the north end of Lake Samish. They are planting trees for each competitor to offset the carbon gasses generated by the race, so I decided to help out and ride my bicycle.

I was up and out the door about 6:30 and very few cars on the road and nice easy ride over to the lake, about 11 mile warm-up arriving at about 7:30. I had hour and half to change, relax, and get my timing chip. Saw Damian video taping a friend of his doing the 50k. The 50k runners started at 7 am and we saw them coming through the first aid station and it was then I knew I was in for a long day. I missed some of the front runners, but by the time I figured out that this was their first time through the aid station meant that they were only at 5k at about 45-50 minutes.

We would be running on the same 5k loop (twice) to start our half marathon. I got fully changed and ready to run, we (I'd say 100-125 runners) were off right on time at 9:00 am and it is less than a quarter mile before we start climbing and the sight of a stream of runners going up in front on the switchbacks and once I was half way up the stream continued behind, quite a site.

The trail was mostly all single track on this 5k loop and we went back and forth and at times came back to spots where the course almost ran back onto the same single track only to turn again at the last chances. I like these looping single track trails, no real destination other than the beauty of the woods. The elevation chart for the 5k loop did not look that bad, but was kind of misleading in that we run two smaller loops to make the single 5k loop, one went up about 200 feet and the other about 300, so nothing too really bad, but there were plenty of ups and down inside the those changes as well. There were a couple sections where we ran along the edge of a hill and it really wasn't a trail, and not even a flat area to run (walk) as each step you kind slipped down the slope a bit, they had a rope so you would completely fall down the hill. Combined with nice muddy conditions made for slower run times. My split for the first 5K was 36:00, ug!

Back up the for the same loop again and with all the 50 milers, 50krs, half marathoners and the 10k runners (sent 15 minutes after us) the trail was really getting more and more slippery. I was very happy to make it back to the aid station marking the finish of my first 10k (second 5k was 41:00).

I thought we would be headed off in a new direction, but we basically just skipped the first half of the 5k loop to start up the second (muddier) loop only to eventually turn to the right at the apex of the 5k loop (we went left the first two times) and while the trail got a lot less muddy, it was a lot more straight up, and up, and up. I really felt like this was steeper than chinscraper (on Chuckanut). Since I had looked at the elevation chart before I knew we were to get up to about 1400 feet or so and my watch said about 600 at the turn so I knew what I was in for. I was simply walking and my HR was pegged. There were not really any switchbacks as we pretty much went straight up. I don't think there was much of a trail here before the race. We eventually made it to the top and based on my calculations this stretch from the lake to the top was 1142 feet of climbing, my GPS recorded 1.52 miles (8025.6 feet) which calculates out to about 14.38% grade = 100*(tan(arcsin(1142/8025.6))). UG! oh yeah, this 1.52 mile walk took just over 32 minutes.

BUT I was at the top, or so I thought, we ran a bit on the top and then it went up a bit more before we started in earnest back down a logging road, this road curved around and as luck would have it, even have some small up hill sections to get down the hill. We finally made it back to some single track and I recognized a couple signs from the Lake Samish county park, so I knew I was getting close to the aid station at mile 10.7. I didn't realize how high these trails went as it took longer than I thought to get back down the lake and the aid station. Great volunteers everywhere and the energy from their excitement helped me along.

We ran along Roy Road to get back towards Camp Lutherwood only to make another detour UP a logging access road to hook back onto the highest point of the first half loop of the 5k. Since I had run this section twice earlier I knew I was close but wasn't able to really ever get a fast run in as it was real muddy by now and I was very tired too. Finally get back to the flatter area near the camp and past the aid station to the grassy finish. Very, Very happy to finish in 3:16:55 by my watch, pretty slow, but I guess the winning half marathon time of 2:20 indicates how hard this course was (so I didn't feel as bad about my slow time)

Sat down for a bit with Damian, thinking about how in the heck am I going to ride my bike home (I hadn't thought of that or that the course would be this hard). Damian was leaving so I asked (ok begged) for a ride up the hill out of the lake basin. He got me up the first part of the hill and I made it slowly up the rest to try and spin easy all the way home.

Great race, great challenge, very tough... not certain I'd do it again... maybe... see if I can improve... only time will tell.

WWU Triathlon VI

2008-05-05T20:24:00.000-07:00

I love doing this event. It has been a great early season test for me and I have improved my time each year. I missed 1 hour by 1 second last year and was hoping to break the elusive 1 hour mark. Another reason I really enjoy this race is all the friends I get to see before and after, a lot of Bellingham triathletes come out for this race.

I've been joining the Bellingham Masters Swim Club in the evenings and it has improved my swimming in just the 4 weeks I've been. I was really hoping to improve on my swim time.

As usual, I arrived pretty early and got a great transition spot on the end pretty close to the bike exit. Now that that was done I had the next 90 minutes to walk around, wait around, and visit. I could of gotten another 30 minutes of sleep as I was early enough that no one else showed for the next 30 minutes or so. People started arriving and I did a quick bike ride to set my bike in the correct gear and leave my shoes attached to the bike. Got my transition area all set and made my way into the pool to get a short warm up. I got about 75 yards before they had us get out for the start.

Debbie and Alex arrived about 5 minutes before my start time, so they hit it perfect and got some great shots. I waited in line for my start time and finally moved into the starting slot.

Started right on time this year, I was off and swimming. I knew Debbie and Alex were at the far end so I tried to give a good photo opportunity and I think they got a good one.

After hamming it up for the camera I tried to settle in at an easy pace and keep an even pace the whole 300 yards. I had been working on this at the masters swims and I think I hit my marks each 100 yards. I got close to the guy in front of me to finish about 10 yards and 5 seconds behind him. I ended up taking 10 seconds off my time from last year. My fastest timed 300 yet at 5:20

Up and out of the water and started the run to the bikes. I'd left some crocs and my jacket near the pool so I could run on the gravel and have my jacket on before I got on the bike. This worked great as I had my jacket on before I got to the bike, biking this early in the season with a wet tank top on doesn't work to well for me.

This is a short 9 mile loop, but they send you up and over quite a few hills just for fun. They adjusted the course slightly to actually take one hill out at the end, so it was a bit shorter than previous years, but my time was the same. 29:32 although I forgot to hit the split until my running shoes were on, so I'd say about 29:00 and put the 32 seconds on my T time.

They send you straight up the hill to the top of the ridge which is the worst of the run. I ran a bit, tried jogging slower, but eventually started to a walk. Just till the next light pole and then started back up and made it to the top and then downhill way past campus just to turn and another hill and then the long slope back up into campus. I thought I was moving along at a pretty good clip but a couple of track team members went past much faster. I was catching other runners though and just tried to keep on moving forward. Up through campus and on a trail out the other side just to turn around again and back towards transition. Last year we finished right next to transition. This year they added about 400 yards as we ran past transition and onto the track for 3/4 around to the finish. My 26:32 was about 3:43 slower than last year, but adding the 400 yards should not of taken that long, so I was a bit slower, oh well, I had fun! but happy to be done too.

1:03:01 total time (last year 1:00:01)

April Snow brings May Flowers

2008-04-20T20:34:00.000-07:00

We got two days of snow here in Bellingham and I decided to ride my mountain bike instead of out on the roads. Had a great time up on Galbraith (but the roads turned out fine and the day was warm and sunny by the end of the day). Had a sprinkle of snow at the house and clouds at the top of Galbraith before I left. The trails were mostly clear of snow, but as I got closer to the top snow covered the trails, good thing I stuck to a known route to the top. On the way back down I made my way to a few trails I've never been on - Papa Bear, Mama Bear and Baby Bear... Guess which one was just right ;-) I also found a new piece of outdoor artwork (the Red and Yellow cylinders).

Mt Si Relay Race!

2008-04-13T18:42:00.001-07:00

Today turned out to be a great day, expected (and packed) for the rain but it never came. I joined Daryl, Erik, Brian and Kevin on a 5 person relay race over 57 miles. We each ran two legs and I ran the first and sixth legs. A total of about 12 miles for me. we kept making up spots and were third place in the Open Male division. Not bad for a group of triathletes and cyclists (non runners). Check out the entire photo album here.

Quick update

2008-03-08T15:41:00.000-08:00

Good news, I'm surviving. I caught a stomach bug, or (still unknown) possibly an ulcer. Various tests and CAT scan told my doctor and a gastrointestinal specialist that I'm looking normal and healthy, so that's good, but neither knows what is going on in my stomach. Best hypothesis is that I caught a stomach virus and just need to let it work itself out.

I am feeling better, but still not normal. I did actually exercise a bit today.

Manning Park

2008-02-10T10:11:00.000-08:00

I left work early on Friday so we could get to Manning Park before it got too dark. We hit the border and had to wait... for one car in front of us, as of Friday it was the quickest I've ever been through the border. The drive is estimated at about 3 hours and we left about 12:15 and we got to Manning Park and unloaded and in our room by 2:45, this includes our 'wait' at the border.

Since we arrived so early we rented some snow shoes and went to explore a little, Alex had a tough time, but we found a little path someone else had made and we decided to explore. It pretty much went up and up and up. Jacob kept on climbing like crazy while I was behind and helping Alex. Alex did great, the packed trail was pretty deep and was up over Alex's waist. If you stepped off into the fresh powder you just sank in.

After dinner we went to the pool and as we arrived it seemed that most the other families left, so we had pretty much the whole place to ourselves. We swam for a while and once we were leaving it looked like a group of high schoolers (20-30+) were just headed to the pool so we hit it spot on.

We were going to spend all day Saturday up at the ski area, Jacob and I went snowboarding and Alex was going to take a ski lesson while Debbie watched and took pictures. Then lunch up there followed by the afternoon in the tube park. Jacob and I got our lift tickets and made our way to the blue chair.

Alex didn't want to take a ski lesson afterall so Debbie and Alex got tube park tickets. Since the tube park is only open on the weekends, and all this extra snow, they had to dig out the tube cable (it pulls you and tube back up the hill) so they just had to wait and Alex wasn't the best waiter.

Jacob and I made it to the top and started down the easy route. Jacob is still learning balance on the board and had many crashes, so it took a while to get down. He was on the wrong side of the route so we couldn't make it up and over this one little section to get back to the blue chair. So we went down toward the lodge area and possibly over to the orange chair. I don't know what happened, but Jacob took off and didn't crash quickly, so he kept gaining speed and headed straight down. faster and faster, headed straight for a dense bunch of trees. I was getting a bit scared, so I treied to speed up but he was maybe a football field in front when he took a very hard crash, end over end, hard to say, but I think it was about 5 or 6 end overs. I got there as quick as I could, and he was pretty startled, but not hurt, so we sat for a bit and decided to be done snowboarding for the day. They were nice enough to give us our lift ticket money back.

We met up with Debbie and Alex and was pretty clear that they wanted to go. Jacob and I were hoping to go tubing, but it was not clear yet. We missed the shuttle bus by 5 minutes so had an hour to wait, we ate a bit and caught the 11 o'clock shuttle back down the hill to the resort. The tube park was still not open yet.

We decided to head home, so we checked out and didn't have to pay for the second night. rather than leaving immediately we rented some skates and took a try at some hockey. Hard enough just to skate and then carry and control a stick and puck was even harder. But we had fun.

Left at 1:00 pm on the nose, and made great time again, I was a little worried about the border as it is always tougher to get back into the US and the lines longer. Boy o Boy, we almost broke the record we set the day before. only 1 car in front of us and we would of made it through faster than the day before, but they switched agents right in front of us. Still very nice. We also stopped on way home to pick up Sugar at the farm we use for boarding. Incuding the border and picking up Sugar, we made it home quicker than the trip up. Back in our driveway at 3:15!

Good fun, but think we will wait for the kids to get a bit older before we try another 'ski' trip.

Back in the Pool!

2008-02-04T12:52:00.000-08:00

Today was the first time in the pool since August 13, I did a few open water swims after that, and my first swim since the swim at the Black Diamond Half Iron on September 22.

I was suprised that I still had some of my speed (I'm still slow, but every 100 was under 2:00) so am happy about that, I clearly did not have any swim fitness and took plenty of rest between sets and kept it short. I'm sure I'll feel something in my shoulders later.

Not much else going on, I'm happy to be able to swim bike and run so I can properly train for Alcatraz!

Sumertime!

2008-01-13T18:54:00.000-08:00

Man what a beautiful day, after a trail run this morning with the group of trail runners I came home and we went for a short hike to look for the bald eagles as they migrate through and eat salmon up on the Nooksack river.

We went to a little park and walked along the river for a bit but only saw some birds soaring around way up high. We saw our neighbors leaving as we arrived and they told us about a great spot not too far away that they were headed to. After our short walk we drove over there and got to look through their monocular. WOW o WOW!

It looked as if you could reach out and touch the birds that were maybe 30 yards across the river on a tree, we then looked at a bird about 3/4 a mile away and it was as if it was right there, very nice setup.

Great summer day in the middle of winter... well if this day was in summer I'd say the opposite, but for today in the middle of cold season, hitting upper 40's and sunny felt like a great summer day.

My little point and click digital camera does not do these birds justice.

2007 Totals

2008-01-02T08:59:00.000-08:00

It was my biggest year of exercising.

Some more raw numbers for you: 469 total hours, 444 different logged workouts, averaging 39 hours a month. My biggest month was May when I had 65 hours logged and also my biggest cycling month with 600 (599.94) miles logged.

I hope to increase by at least 24 hours in 2008, after all, it is a leap year and I hope to use those extra 24 hours exercising!

2007 - What a wonderful year!

2007-12-27T09:07:00.000-08:00

We sure got a lot accomplished this year, everyone is healthy and strong and ready for the new year.

Bike to School and Bike to Work Day

IRONMAN!

Jacob Triathlon

Kitchen ready for demolishion

More Demo

Cleaned up and ready for Cabinets

Tree House

New and old Doors

the finished kitchen

Finished Tree House

Attachmate Holiday Party

All (and more!) photos can be found here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/Gervais2007

WOOO HOOO!!! I won the lottery!!!!!!

2007-12-15T19:46:00.000-08:00

I entered the lottery two weeks ago and today was the drawing and I got an email this evening to congratulate me on winning the chance to enter the Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon on June 8, 2008!!!

WOOOO HOOOOO!!!!

I get to swim about 1.5 miles from Alcatraz in 55 degree water to the San Francisco waterfront, run about 1 mile from swim exit to the bike transition area, bicycle 18 miles around the hills of San Francisco finishing with an 8 mile run which includes a beach section and the famous sand stairs!

WOOOO HOOOOOO!!!!!

Check it out

Whats the difference?

2007-12-10T08:48:00.001-08:00

Last Thursday I had what I thought was surgery to remove a small bump from my neck. The doctor and nurses kept calling it a procedure. I've had this lump drained a few times over the past three years and my family doc suggested surgery to get rid of the infection completely. Basically it was an ingrown hair on the back of my neck that got infected and due to the extra tough skin on the back of your neck prevents the natural secretion of oil through the skin and the oil just collects forming a small lump. I missed running one of my favorite races, the Bellingham Jingle Bell run this weekend but I'm recovering just fine, back at work the next day. My only real problem is the bandages and sticky tape starts to annoy my neck.

So whats the difference between surgery and a surgical procedure?

Weekend of rides

2007-11-26T08:08:00.000-08:00

Finally got out on a outdoor winter 'long' ride with Mike and friend (Jim). We met near the Vet clinic in Fairhaven and road out the interurban trail and then up, up, up Cleator road to the top. I put on two pairs of socks, leg warmers, three shirts, thick skull cap covering my ears, toasty warm gloves and I was still cold. Once underway, I was able to warm up by working hard, and boy was it hard. Climbing the 3.6 mile Cleator road we climbed about 1500 feet in the 3.6 miles, which is tough, but still a bit deceiving as about 1 mile of this is a flat section about half way up. I ended up having to walk a bit just to gather some more strength.

Once at the top Mike took a couple photos and we ate an then after getting cold, started back down. This was not nearly as fun, lots of pot holes and pretty fast going downhill so had to keep on the brakes and this was tough as I got colder and colder as we descended as I did not need to pedal, nor could I really as I was pretty much just standing and holding onto the handlebars and brakes as I rattled over the many small divots.

Back on the interurban it was nice to be able to pedal and start to warm up again. All in all a very nice 2 and half hour ride from home to top of Cleator and home again.

Road with Jacob on Sunday, we left mid morning and road to the bike jump park near the skate park. We road along some roads, but road the trails through Whatcom Falls park and really did not have much traffic to deal with, Jacob did great staying to the side and on the sidewalk when necessary. Jacob wore his fingerless bike gloves and within a mile asked for the full finger gloves I offered at the beginning.

The bike jump park wasn't really as much fun as we expected as it was quite muddy and actually the jumps were too big for Jacob and I to jump. So we tried to ride a couple of the smaller jumps but just ended up getting mud all over our shoes and tires.

The ride back home we got most the mud off our tires as it spun off and up our backsides and some onto our fronts as we gained speed on a couple downhill sections on the way home.

Great weekend of cold riding!

Cyclocross and more

2007-11-19T08:31:00.000-08:00

I went and raced another cyclocross race this weekend. This weeks race was up in Lynden racing on the fairgrounds. Ryan, from cyclocrazed.com, really setup another great course. This course felt much more like my first cyclocross race (at WWU) with lots of tight turns around trees, zig zagging back and forth over slick wet grass and under big pine trees and all the nice soft (slippery) pine needles underneath. The course also included a fast (long) descent on a gravel road transitioning (at speed) onto some long unkempt grass, with more twisting and turning under big trees. The run-up was very tough run up loose dirt with the final 15 feet or so at a much steeper pitch than the first 75 feet. Had to use a big push to get up and over the top each time.

BUT, the course include two unique sections that helped to make this course very memorable. Ryan sent us on a twisting loop with a hairpin turn at one end through some soupy mud in the grandstand area where they hold concerts and the demolition derby during the fair. This section went from soupy mud to more solid ground and back and forth until your bike was just caked in mud and dirt to a short section with a small spiral to ride into one of the barns. This was not just a way to get from one side to the other, this barn has a skateboard park setup inside and Ryan sent us up and over one of the jumps. Very fun!

This was the last event of the 2007 season for Ryan and cyclocrazed.com. I hope he can find more venues and open weekends in future seasons, cyclocross is a lot of fun, you can ride on a moutainbike if you want, so come on out and get some exercise and get a bit dirty next fall.

Drove out with good friend Mike and he took some pictures and wrote about his experience at the race too, check out his blog here: http://mcqview.blogspot.com/2007/11/tractor-cross_17.html

I also worked on a cabinet I'm making for my parents, I got most of my dado's and rabbit cuts done and was able to dry assemble the cabinet, it is looking good. It has been a lot of work, but hopefully be done before Christmas. Still need to cut slots for the sliding doors and assemble the doors themselves. I did stain up a couple scrap pieces to show my parents over thanksgiving to see what they like. I like the no stain area, this mahogany is very nice wood.

I was also able to finally get the roofing on the tree house (I'll post a blog with lots of pics soon now that I'm done). Jacob, Alex and the rest of the neighborhood seem to like the tree house. I may need to rework the ladder as the current rope ladder is tough to climb.

Great weekend of fun exercise!

2007-10-29T09:05:00.000-07:00

Had a busy weekend, it all started out with the Cyclocrazed cycle cross event at Cornwall Park in Bellingham. I had lots of fun, great weather, one mechanical issue (twig from a tree got stuck in my derailleur and had to stop and get off to 'fix' my wheel so I could pedal), one crash (complete endo over the front handle bars as I attempted to ride over one of the log barriers - needless to say I ran and carried the bike every other time).

I raced in the Mens C category and we did five laps all around Cornwall park, including a large circle of death on the big grass field where we spiralled around and around getting closer to the center to a hairpin turn at the center to spiral all the way back out. This was very cool, we had maybe 20 - 30 riders in this same spiral on the first lap and was neat having riders going both in and out at the same time. Kind of an optical illusion, some riders passing you but were really still behind or in front of you.

The course went through a lot of underbrush under all the tall evergreens. Not much underbrush, but more tons of pine needles, small tree twigs, some big twigs, but this soft surface also caused the twigs and such to kick up and I got some in my derailleur a couple times. One worked itself out and another was big enough to cause my chain to not even move, which made it tough to pedal, had to stop for that one.

One run up which you could ride if you had a lead up ride to get some momentum, but the course creator forces you up the side of the hill, hitting the pathway used for the run up about a quarter of the way up. By doing it this way, made it tough to start riding your bike in the middle of a pretty steep hill. I ran/pushed my bike every time, my friend Mike rode up a couple times, but it worked out to be about the same.

After the race I made my way out to the soccer fields for Jacobs game. We stopped on the way back to get a couple birthday gifts (Jacob had two parties this weekend) and home in time to eat and wrap gifts and finally relax a bit.

Sunday morning I ran with the trail runners, we had a great run, about 15+ miles just under 3 hours of moving time. We ran out past Lost Lake, which made me wish I had brought my camera, it was perfectly still, not a ripple, very black looking. I wonder how deep it is. After running past Lost Lake we got to our destination, a trail called 'So Easy', well it is not much of a run at this point because it is pretty much straight up.

We wait for each other at major intersections, or key locations and at the top of 'So Easy' we regrouped and decided to complete the loop around Chuckanut by running down past Fragrance Lake and the $2 (two dollar) trail, dumping out onto Cleator road and down to the Interurban back to the Vet and our cars. My knee started hurting, so started getting farther and farther behind the group. We met up on Cleator road I doing more of the down hill stuff it kept on hurting, but once on the flat Interurban I was able to run. It hurt some at the beginning, but towards the final mile or so was able to run without much pain. I did take a shortcut as I was pretty far off the back and actually finished a bit a head of half the group.

Halloween costumes were part of Jacobs birthday party today, so after ice on my knee and lunch helped Jacob and Alex get all dressed up. Man was I glad to just have to drop them off, 10-15 kids all dressed up with no place to go, it was quite hectic over at Jimmy's house.

Runningshoes.com MTB Duathlon

2007-10-22T08:15:00.001-07:00

This is the third time I've done this event and first time we had no rain, there was still a bit o mud up on some of the trail but it was a great day.

As always I arrived quite early to pickup my packet and shirt. Got settled, road one lap around the lake to warm up and then setup my transition, great spot near the entry/exit. Lots of friends do this race so it is a great time chatting and releasing the pre race tension.

The race starts with one lap running around the lake, then we mountain bike followed by another run around the lake. They changed the bike loop from two laps of the 'beginner' course to one lap of the 'expert' course. The expert course adds some serious hills, some pretty easy switchbacks and then hooks up onto the beginner course and doing only one lap makes this a slightly shorter event than in the past.

Lance was being Lance at the start and held up the starting gun and yelled 'GO', then about 10 seconds into the run he fired the starting gun, put a big smile on my face at least. I always seem to start my runs a bit fast, but with a bike and then another run, I wanted to go a bit slower than a fast run, maybe tempo pace. Thought I was in pretty good company and felt good throughout, carried my bike gloves and during the final quarter mile or so, ate a gel and put on my gloves.

My mountain biking shoes are just my running shoes so quickly put on the helmet and was off, nice quick transition. This was maybe my 5th ride on my new bike (well new to me) and I think it's great. I was able to climb and coming back down hardly felt the drops and bumps. very nice, very quick. I did get passed by more than a few going up, but was not passed on the way back down. I did catch up with someone and was happy to stay a bit behind as I was also thinking about the run after.

Back into transition I again had a 20 second stop to park bike, take off helmet and grab my running hat. I think I gained ground in the transition area on more than a few competitors.

The second run is the opposite way around the lake and starts with a bit of a hill (not really anything to talk about) making the transition from biking to running a bit of work, but once at the top of the crest starting feeling like running. Shortly after though my stomach started saying when are you going to stop running, so I slowed a bit, took the better part of the lake before I felt like really running fast again. Coming around the lake past the play structure (about a quarter mile from the finish) I see Debbie and Alex and Alex was ready for a high five, but after the high five he wanted to run with me, so I slowed (a bit) and he kept up for the final quarter mile and got lots of cheers.

About an hour after the adult race they do a kids duathlon and Jacob did it again for the third time, he did the 'long course' with about a half mile run, bike around the lake and then the same half mile run. He did great. I think he could bike faster, but completed everything with a look of determination and trademark tongue stickin out, working hard!

Great event and great day.

Great race and event overall

On the Trail again...

2007-10-01T07:59:00.000-07:00

Finally got back on the trail again this weekend, running with the same group I was before. Boy o boy did I miss this. Didn't realize how much till out running this weekend with the group.

Rained the whole time, nice easy pace, catching up on the news (no gossip at all ;-), what a great time. The time/distance just melted away, before I knew it we were back at the cars.

Its great to be on the trail again
Running with the best of friends
Just can't wait to get on the trail again

Black Diamond Half Iron

2007-09-23T20:21:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I actually like being a slow swimmer...

Came down on Friday to stay with Debbie's parents, nice easy and relaxing. Up early to get the worm, or at least a good parking spot within the state park. As usual I'm an early bird and got there before the park gate was open, but not first in line (second).

Sat and read and eventually someone came an opened the gate to let us (1o or so) early arrivers in. I probably could of slept in a bit more as I noticed some spots as late as 6:30 but I was up anyway so oh well.

Got my packet and put the numbers in the correct spots and went to get body marked and find my transition spot. They provide lots of bike racks, but put about 20 per 20 feet and they are numbered in 20's so I try to find a kinda open spot in my grouping, but not much bigger than a postage stamp.

With the great parking I was able to leave some stuff in the car and not use up as much space in transition anyway. There must of been 200 bikes on 15 or so racks and about 20 more unused racks. I (along with quite a few others) asked about spreading out into an unused area so I ended up moving and had a whole rack to myself, it was great.

I had some stomach issues going on too, just a bit unsettled, gurgling and such. Wasn't sure if I was going to have to stick close to the porto-lets or actually get to race, maybe it was just nerves because as once I started getting my wetsuit on and fully ready to go my stomach settled down.

The swim is a two lap course and I hadn't done much swimming since Coeur d'Alene so was just hoping for anything under 45 and as it turns out I only missed last years time by about 20 seconds or so. I was a little worried on the second lap as I swam and pretty much only saw the pink swim caps of the second wave of all women, not many green (men's wave) caps. Once I saw my time coming up to transition I was happy.

Swim: 43:32 (1.2 miles - 2:04/100 yards)

It was great to have the whole rack to myself, I was able to stomp my wetsuit off, dry my feet, get socks and shoes on, jersey, sunglasses and helmet and was off, faster than last year.

T1 - 2:40

They changed the bike course this year (from 62 miles to proper Half Iron 56 miles) so I knew I was going to improve on my time, but I started out strong and started passing people right away. This is where I really like being a slow swimmer, I had the 180th fastest swim (out of 219). I like having these rabbits to catch, so I count them, helps keeps me focused, plus one for everyone I pass, minus one for when someone passes me.

They added two out and backs to the loop to the north we have done in the past for this course, this turned the north loop into 24.75 miles (same course they use for the Olympic tri) and the middle loop to the south was cut considerably shorter and skipped the Mud Mountain road (2 mile uphill).

I had ridden most of this course in previous years, but wasn't sure what to expect on the new out and backs and part of the south loop. The first out and back was on a dead end and nice and wide and a little uphill, but we got to come right back down that. The second out and back was a turnaround on a busy main road. I was a little worried on how they would work this, but it was great, they had two police officers with stop signs and only letting cars through if there were no bicyclist, the gap between was a couple football fields of wide open road and we had the whole width to turn around, didn't loose too much speed.

I finished the first loop of 25 miles in 1:13 and change and knew I was flying (for me at least). I was up 39 positions by then, still feeling good and not tired or anything. My goal for the bike was to hopefully break 3 hours and my quick math told me had a good shot if I get the south loop done in 20 and 1:20 for the repeated north loop.

We head south and it got a bit windy, but not too bad, my pace of counting slowed quite a bit on the south loop and the repeat of the north. We were getting further strung out and the space between riders was much larger. We stayed on the main road for a couple miles with no protection from the wind, finally turning over to a side road for the route back and got to use some of that (now a tail) wind.

Passing back in front of the state park at 1:33 meant I was still on pace and I hit the 1:33 right on, just need to keep the pace for the final 25 miles.

My right knee started to talk to me about mile 40 or so. I started to ease off just a bit. I had been leap frogging one rider. I'd pass on the hill, she'd pass me back, then another rolling hill and I'd get my spot back and then finally she was able to get away as I just had to slow a bit to not hurt as much.

There is a long straight before the first out and back and generally downhill, but rolling and I was able to fully hammer through this without any pain and the hill on the out and back was fine too. My number had gotten as high as 48, but with the knee pain and easing I got back down to 41, I kept thinking I gotta keep going, I can't give these all back, I earned it. I was happy to be able to ride pain free all the way back to the state park and in doing so, got my final number back up to finish at 49. Very happy, what a great ride!

Bike - 2:54:24 (56 miles - 19.27 MPH)

Coming back into T2 I stopped and used the porto-lets and still had a pretty quick T2. I did a test run this week with bungee laces and (thankfully) decided to stick with regular laces and run a comfortable half marathon. Changed the shoes, got rid of the helmet and grabbed the race belt and took off for an afternoon run.

T2 - 2:08

I had one goal for the run and that was to run and not walk. The previous two times I did this event I ended up walking a good portion of the half marathon. I know I can run a pretty decent half marathon, but after swimming and biking it just had not come together.

I started out slow, a secondary goal was to break 2 hours, so I tried to stick to 9 minute miles and hope for the best. The course was not as well marked as previous years, but the few mile markers I saw, I was ahead of the 9 minute pace.

I keep count on the run too, I think mostly to keep my mind on something other than my feet and body. So I look and count other peoples feet and bodies.

I kept picking off the miles and before I knew it I was at the furthest turn around and headed back, its all downhill from here , right? head home now! gotta keep going as its the only way back. I was still feeling good at this point, I had some water at every aid station alternating my own gels or thermolyte tablets. On the way back though I started to not want to eat, I tried my clif blocks and started chew, but just ended up spitting it out as it didn't want to go down.

No problem, I'm almost home, I can make it. There is a section of a dirt road that is not gravel and not really dirt. I'd say it is mostly fist to shoe sized rocks, not the best or most fun to run on, but I kept on keepin on passing a few more in this section as I think my trail running helped some through here.

Back on the road you have to run past the state park to enter through a back trail and then you are so close you can hear the music, hear the announcer calling peoples name at the finish, but they send us on the final 1.4 mile loop around the lake.

I had gotten up to plus 18 at the start of the lake loop, but I was hurting, I kept on running though. very slowly. It is not like running around Green Lake (flat paved trail) not like running around Lake Padden (wide well groomed gravel with ups and downs). This is more like an extra wide single track you might find while out mountain biking. The path is exposed root after exposed root, they do mark them, but the ground is almost all powdery white from all the roots that are marked. not to mention to brutal ups and downs (not too bad, but at mile 70 of this 70.3 adventure) I was hurting and they felt brutal.

8 people passed me in the final 1.4 to finish at plus 10. I had no energy, I usually have something to kick it in and across the finish line, but I had nothing. I did get a smile and thumbs up in for the photographer, but was happy to be done. I even had the volunteer taking my timing strap off open my water bottle for me.

Run 1:57:55 (13.1 miles - 9:00/mile)

Total 5:40:39 (83/202 Overall - 22/26 Male 35-39)

I went down and soaked in the nice cool lake for a bit while I thought about the great race I just had. I actually felt like a raced it too, first time I felt like I raced a triathlon of this distance. I hit all my goals and then some. I was hoping to break 6 hours and smashed that out the door, broke 3 on the bike, sub 2 on the run, ran the entire run. all in all a great race.

Weird tidbit of info: final place of 83 matched my race number of 83

Boys day out

2007-09-16T13:48:00.001-07:00

Mountain biking with the boys up on Galbraith mountain was great! We started early and did get some rain, but finished before the heavy stuff started. Great riding with friends, great riding on new trails, great all around!

Ride 542 (Mt Baker Hill Climb)

2007-09-09T18:47:00.001-07:00

What a great day, not a cloud anywhere on the way up or down.

We met before 6 to carpool up and arrived in plenty of time to get fully dressed and bikes all ready. It was cold because there were no clouds overnite either. We wanted to get going to warm the legs and body up.

There were lots and lots of riders, they roll us west on SR542 back out of downtown Glacier to the mile post 33 "starting line". Kevin, Joel and I were towards the back of the group, but once we started we were able to use both sides of the road and I was able to move up quickly. By about a mile into the ride I was within 100 yards of the leaders and on the first downhill section of the uphill ride we were crusin along at better than 30 MPH.

The ride is 24 plus miles from Glacier up to Artist Point which is about 5k past the Mt Baker ski area. The lower first 11 miles or so is the steepest section past Nooksack River Falls. I was about 5 minutes faster up this section than the recon ride last week.

Just past here we get a false flat up past the DOT station to the real climb. It is not as steep but it is much longer, the final 12 miles is just up, go around a corner and then its more up. next switchback, more up, up, up.

You go past the lower ski lodge and you need to either not know the road or gather your mental strength as it seems like forever to get to Heather Meadows and the upper ski lodge. After multiple switchbacks and passing the sign (about 1 mile before the real Heather Meadows) you finally get to the upper ski area.

Now it gets interesting as you turn up the final 5k ascent. This uppper section is what you think of in the Alps of the Tour de France, above the tree line and lots of switchbacks that you can see above you (and below you). This part is tough for me too as once you pass the Austin Pass parking lot you got a big, long switchback and you think your close, but once around the upper part of this you hit the Lake Ann trailhead parking lot and you see a repeat of what looks like the same big, long switchback, but this is great too as you start to see many more spectators, hear the cowbells and it helps get you up to the top.

They mark each kilometer of the final 5k and in between 2k and 1k to go I start to fell real sluggish, I thought it might just be because of my location (riding up the side of a mountain), but as it got worse I noticed some give to my rear tire, yeah I had a slow leaking flat. I started to feel my rim on the ground, so stood up over the handlebars and got a bit better, but couldn't stand the final 1.5k. Once I sat back down I realized I had to stop, ug!

Got my wheel off the bike, got out my tire levers, was about to release the final bits of air to get the tire off the rim, but noticed it still had a good amount of air, so decided to simply fill with my CO2 cartridge. Filled it up, loaded up my gear, and back underway. It was a slow leak and I was able to finish with just the refill of air. (I did a full change before riding back down)

I was close to the 2 hour mark I've been hoping to get, still a personal best on my third time in this event. If I had no flat I still wouldn't of made it under 2 hours.

Great ride, highly recommend to everyone.

Hill Climb recon

2007-09-02T13:18:00.000-07:00

Met a couple friends and we drove up to the Glacier park and ride. We parked and then rode the bikes to rest of the 24 or so miles to the top ending at Artist Point. Great weather today, very little traffic, Mike and Mark are much better riders than me and as such mike was able to get a repeat of the final 3 (toughest) miles from the ski area to the top. Both are ready for the actual event next weekend. I'm ready too! Just hope for decent weather.

RSVP

2007-08-19T17:49:00.000-07:00

Ride from Seattle to Vancouver and Party

Kevin and I started this little bike ride on Thursday as we made our way to Seattle via a couple different cars and two wonderful drivers (our wifes).

Spent the night at my parents and got up early to ride to the start line at Sand Point, got settled and we were off in the right direction (south). The ride heads south for about .25 mile before turning around onto the Burke Gilman trail and we had a grand time. The weather cooperated and the food stops were awesome. Saw some other riders and friends we know along the way. Got into the stop in Bellingham and rode home for a first day total of about 112 miles.

Since the kids were with the grandparents, Debbie and I went out for dinner and watched a movie we picked out. Got to bed and was up again early as Kevin and I wanted to head out about 6:30, rode up to Kevin's and we were off.

We should of not had breakfast as once we went into the Dutch Mothers bakery in Lynden we found out they put on a special buffet for the riders, we both just ordered a scone and was it ever good! Next time get the breakfast buffet.

Hit the border at 8:04 am just after they opened and continued north through farmland and lots of horse country. Went past an equestrian show and got some pictures for Debbie and pretty soon we were at the ferry for a very short ride across the river. Back on the bikes and another 5 miles we made it to the only food stop on the second day ride.

After some food and a short rest we got back at it, Kevin was hurting a bit but once we hit the outskirts of Vancouver and going through neighborhood after neighborhood I think he got distracted and didn't notice the shooting pain in his knee as much, He was our navigator and got us through all the twists and turns.

We totally lucked out and had NO RAIN for the whole two day ride... we did have some snow though, yep snow on August 18 in downtown Vancouver where they were filming a movie, pretty neat.

The end was a little of a let down, after all that way, we turn into a parking garage, an underground parking garage, so we head down, down, down to the depths and find a nice security lady guarding the bike coral who took our finish picture. We went upstairs and found the 'party' (yeah small p) and it was not much to write home about, or blog about other than we made it! had our free burger and paid for a beer and visited with some other riders, while a DJ played the radio in the background.

Rode the 1k to our hotel, checked in, showered and then went for a great afternoon/evening out on a double date night, took the subway, water taxi, walked around Granville Island, dinner there, back to downtown via water taxi and subway, and went for drinks at our hotel lounge, which was on the 42nd floor and rotates like the Space Needle, and did I mention the weather was awesome! had a great view all around as we sat, visited and spent way too much on way too little to drink.

Woke up Sunday morning and went for a run in Stanley Park, I couldn't pass it up and ran all around the seawall except for a section under repair due to storm damage, cleaned up and went for Starbucks and then we made our way to check-out and found an IKEA, about an hour wait at the border back and then Kevin and Robin dropped us off in time to relax and get settled.

Whistler

2007-07-27T06:53:00.000-07:00

We went to Whistler last weekend with Debbie's parents and her brothers family. What a great time. Second year we have been, second year of rain, we will go again and hopefully get some sunny weather. All photos can be found here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/WhistlerJuly2007

Clear Lake Race Report

2007-07-16T09:09:00.000-07:00

We had planned on getting up early to go watch some of the Tour de France down at The Mount Bakery - a local Belgian bakery, but skipped it for a little extra sleep before we headed south. I loaded up and then got the kids fed and loaded and we were off.

Clear Lake is about 30-40 minutes south of Bellingham, just east of Mount Vernon and I thought we were late, but as it turns out the race started at 9:00 instead of the 8:30 I had thought, so we had plenty of time to get setup and relax and play a bit.

My parents same up from Seattle to watch Jacob do the kids race which starts after the adults race. They arrived early enough to watch me race too, very nice! The lake has a very nice small park with a great play structure for the kids, some slides to slide into the water, nice sandy beach and it was turning out to be a beautiful day.

The race got underway a bout 5 minutes late to allow cleaning up some of the road construction. The swim is basically a 1/3 mile triangle and the start in between the swim docks was a little tight. I think I hit and got hit just as much as my Ironman swim. Once around the two turns and coming back into shore, it did clear up a bit. I got out of the water in just under 12 minutes, right where I was hoping.

I decided to try to race with no socks to see if I could save some time, so my swim to bike transition was very fast, just sunglasses, helmet and shoes and was off, no drying , no stopping to put on socks. I was able to bike without socks without any pain or blisters. This is a short sprint race and was only a 15 mile ride, out and back so you get to see all the leaders and who is coming up behind you. Pretty flat too, one hill and I really didn't even notice how big the hill was until I was coming back down. I passed 14 people on the bike and had two pass me, I know one very well as I ride with him most weekends, the other was wearing the new Bellingham Tri Club gear but I did not recognize him. Even though it was so short I was happy to finish as I was going VERY hard the whole way, finishing in 42:17 (or 21.3 MPH and averaged 154 HR which is a lot higher than I train at).

My bike to run transition was very fast too, I had transitioned to bare feet on top of my bike shoes on the last 200 yards of the bike so just needed to run to my spot, set bike and helmet down and put on my running shoes, this was a little harder than I expected as my feet were still a little damp, but got them on, grabbed my race number and hat and was headed out.

I could feel that I wished I had socks on, it was rubbing me the wrong way, but I made it through with only a couple cuts on one foot, no blisters, so no complaints. I checked my watch at the mile marker and saw 6:45 so I was moving along pretty good. Kept picking off people too, one at a time here and there and hit the turn around at 13:13 still moving fast. Finally got passed by one faster runner just after the turn around, but I kept on trucking along and pretty soon I saw the 1 mile to go sign. The first part of the last mile was a bit tough, but after a couple turns you can see how close you are getting and before I knew it was around the last turn and turned it up a bit more and then the final 150 yard dash was a nice sprint to finish it off. I passed 6 on the run and had 1 pass me. not bad at all! 26:39 run or 6:40 per mile 160 HR!

Final time of 1:22:20 and 13th overall position!

Relaxed a bit and then got Jacobs transition all set, He wanted me to swim/bike/run with him so I did a second triathlon and it was just as much fun as the first. Jacob used a kick board and I swam along side, his swim was about 100 yards and he did great, ran quickly up and out of the water and I helped rinse off his feet. He was going sock less as well, got on his shoes and helmet and I set him off while I got my shoes and helmet on too. I quickly caught up and we rode the 1.5 mile ride having a nice conversation. Back at transition, we ran to drop off our bikes and I told him just to set it down and I would catch up after I set the bikes in place. He ran most all the .6 mile course with only one walk section this year. He really wanted to improve on his time from last year and was about 3-4 minutes faster. He was very happy!

After his race I found out that I actually finished my race in first place for my age group (Male 35-39) so that was a nice surprise. They do a great raffle for all sorts of stuff, but Jacob was a little disappointed again this year, two years in a row and our names were not called (75 or more prizes on the table to choose from).

After, my parents took us all out for lunch and treats at Dairy Queen, so I think Jacob's disappointment did not last long! Great day and very happy to have my parents come watch Jacob and I race. Alex had fun playing and I was able to swim and catch him coming down the slide. Great Day!

IRONMAN Coeur d'Alene Race Report

2007-06-28T09:48:00.000-07:00

IRONMAN Coeur d’Alene
June 24, 2007

I got an ok night of sleep, got up about 4 am to eat and load up the car while the kids slept. Jacob woke up and got dressed and I carried Alex out to the car in his pajamas and we were off about 4:35 or so.

I dropped off my special needs bags, put my nutrition mix and gels on my bike and found someone to pump up my tires, and then finally got body marked. I met up with Debbie and the kids and we went to check out the swim start area and walked towards the Coeur d’Alene Resort. After many hugs, kisses and good wishes I went back towards transition and sat down to relax a bit.

About 6:20 or so I started to get my wetsuit on and dropped my dry clothes bag off and was on the beach with about 15 – 20 minutes to go. I moved to the far right got my cap and goggles on and then heard the national anthem and was ready to go.

SWIM 2.4 Miles – 1:29:12 – 2:21 per 100 meters
Before I knew it I heard the cannon and I slowly walked down behind the runners. It took me about 15 seconds before I was in and deep enough to start swimming.

The oncoming whitecaps and rollers from the wind were tough to get a good stroke going, the waves had no regularity so you could not get a rhythm as to know when to breathe and when to sight. I was pretty much following the swimmers in front of me.

The real mess was at the first turn buoy. I planned to swim a bit wide but didn’t go wide enough and was caught in the mess. The swim section parallel to the beach was extra tough as the whitecaps kept pushing everyone in and that made the second turn buoy tougher than the first as not many were able to swim wide. I made it around and the waves kind of pushed us towards the shore but it didn’t help too much as I found it harder to know when to breathe and when to sight.

I was amazed when I saw the timing clock at 41 minutes as I got out of the water. The wind and associated whitecaps were just as bad on the second lap and I did not have nearly as many people in front to block and use for sighting. Not nearly as many people at the turn, but was still a tight turn with lots of people.

My calf cramped up tight once around the buoy, so I had to stop swimming and rolled over onto my back for almost half a minute while I tried to stretch and not get hit or swam over. I worked through it and got back into the beach with a total of 1:29:12 and boy was I happy. Under my goal of 1:30!

T1 - 6:47
I walked up the beach past over a 1000 people lining the barriers, awesome! I picked an open pair of wetsuit peelers and they pulled and tugged and within a couple seconds my wetsuit was off.

I found an empty chair in the changing tent. Once dry and bike gear on, I was out the door to the next set of volunteers and had two nice lades slather my arms and neck with sunscreen before I jogged off to grab my bike. I saw Debbie and the kids at the fence near my bicycle and they cheered for me and it felt great to be sent off like that.

BIKE 112 Miles – 6:38:58 – 16.8 mph
I exited the bike transition and the town streets were packed full of people cheering you on. I tried to settle into a nice and easy rhythm to keep my heart rate down. Coming back through town after first out and back in about 45 minutes I Debbie and the kids and got a little misty eyed as I made my way up and onto the middle 40 mile loop that had most all the hills.

I hardly noticed the first hill and before I knew it I was up and over the steepest hill section and ready for the rolling hills and again before I knew it was out at the furthest north turn around, about 35 miles into the course in under two hours, man I thought I was going too fast.

Back into town over the few more rollers and the final 10 miles or so is generally downhill and then you do get to ride through the barriers and tons of people cheering for you, it was awesome!

First loop done in 3:08 and change and I was off for the second loop, repeating the exact same route out and along the lake. I stopped at one of the vault toilets along the lake and at the bike special needs drop bags to reload my nutrition mix. I walked a bit to stretch my legs and toes.

The section through town was once again awesome and then up into the hill loop. Even the outer sections of the hilly area had lots of people, each aid station was like a party zone, people had parties in their driveways, some major intersections, and at the furthest turnaround was a large group all dressed in red cheering everyone on, I saw someone dressed up as Elmo way out here too, man it was great.

I got off the bike at the start of the aid station at mile 96 and walked through as if it was a run course aid station to stretch, get off the bike and use the facilities.

The short two mile out and back was great as I knew I was so close to being done and hammered out and back to make the second loop in about 3:30.

T2 - 4:53
I went straight to one of the porta potties then got my bag from the volunteer and back into the changing tent. This was quicker as I just had to take the bike shoes off and put the running shoes on.

It felt great to get the bike shoes off and the running shoes on. I stopped at the sun screeners again and got slathered, they got my ears and face this time in addition to my arms and shoulders, it was like a great mid race massage.

RUN 26.2 Miles - 4:56:22 – 11:19 per mile
I was now on my strongest portion of the triathlon and I was off and running towards the first short out and back section along the river. After the turn around, I checked my watch at the 1 mile marker and saw 8:30, not a bad pace at all maybe a bit fast but I was feeling ok and shortly after, just before getting back near the transition area, I saw Debbie and kids and they saw me and started to cheer and boy oh boy was it great. What a lift, each time I saw them my pace quickened a bit and I’m sure my smile got bigger.

The tunnel of people on each side of the barriers as you run past the transition area was like what you see when you watch the Tour de France, it was packed full of people on each side and lots and lots of them are calling out your name and man it was awesome. Just past this, you run through downtown Coeur d’Alene and the streets are closed and each side of the street is packed. You get this feeling for about 5 or 6 blocks before the turn towards the residential section before you get to the lake area.

I was able to run pretty much the first 10 miles, but after that I settled into a run/walk and made it back into town and the crowd helped me run, how could you walk when thousands of people are cheering for you and calling your name. I made it past the transition area in about 2:08 for the first half marathon.

Once past the river dike section and downtown and the residential section and back along the lake I was starting to turn into a walk/run. I had plenty of energy to run, but was too sore all over my legs and feet so wanted to walk so I did. I did run the hill up the turnaround because I knew I would walk back down so I ran up, felt great!

The way back was more walk than run and back through the residential section I tried to run and was starting to turn back into a run/walker and once past the last aid station about mile 25 I ran the final mile plus all the way home.

Coming down the final 5 blocks is all downhill and packed with 2000-3000 people all cheering for me and lots would read my name and call out “Go Glenn!” or “Way to go Glenn”, man it was awesome. About two blocks from the finish chute I started to slow as I was looking for Debbie and the kids as I wanted to finish with Jacob and Alex. Some people said don’t slow down now, you can do it, but I finally found the kids, or Jacob found me and ran out of the kids corral area and I asked if Alex was coming. Debbie got him out of the stroller and we all ran down the finish chute and I even heard Mike Reilly call my name (correctly too) and where I was from and most importantly that “YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!!!!”

SWIM: 2.4 Miles – 1:29:12
T1: 6:47
BIKE: 112 Miles – 6:38:58
T2: 4:53
RUN: 26.2 Miles – 4:56:12
FINAL: 13:16:11
PLACE: 217/344
AGPLACE: 1108/2085 OA

It's Offical, I am an IRONMAN!

2007-06-24T21:40:00.000-07:00

Man I'm tired, no long post tonight, it was long, it was hard, but it was FUN!

I uploaded pics to my Picasa web album, so check that out for now. Full report coming soon once we get home and I can gather all my thoughts.

Thanks to all to helped support me through all of this, Thanks to all you kept me in their thoughts and prayers today, I know it helped (especially out on the run)

Today is the day!!!!!!

2007-06-24T04:06:00.000-07:00

Up early to get some calories and then we will leave soon.

The calm before the storm

2007-06-23T16:00:00.000-07:00

Time to relax and take it easy for the rest of today.

After enjoying breakfast at the hotel, the whole family went down and found a new place to park (on the Idaho college campus) and it should be a good place for race day too. I went for a short bike ride followed by an even shorter run while Debbie and the kids went to the park.

We met after and all went to the expo and the kids got some IRONMAN souvenirs and left messages for me at the Ford display. These inspirational messages are triggered by the timing chip and show up on large reader board during the Ford Motivational Mile (yeah everything is sponsored).

We walked around and looked at bike entry/exit area and the run exit and then over to the finish line (almost all setup) before meeting Aunt Pam and Uncle Pat for lunch. We had a nice visit and then took our time back to the hotel by driving up past Silverwood and then drove part of the furthest northern part of the bike course.

Back at the hotel we are now relaxing and hope to get to bed early.

Live video and athlete tracking is up on www.ironman.com

Friday Fun Day

2007-06-22T14:24:00.000-07:00

The only 'events' I planned on doing today was the morning swim and the evening banquet and athlete meeting, so once done swimming (another day of wind and whitecaps) I drove back to the hotel and went to the continental breakfast with everyone.

After, we drove to CdA and drove out part of the bike/run course along the lake and then went for a hike in Tubbs Hill Park. Near the trail head is a memorial to Hydroplane drivers. (In the back of the local awesome hamburger joint -Hudsons - is a little Hydroplane museum that we stumbled upon at lunch on Thursday). What great views, the trail was a little bumpy, but we made it and went to play at the park toy structures for a while. We went for lunch at a San Francisco Sourdough sandwich shop and they were great and even better, next door was a Cold Stone Creamery.

A little rest at the hotel and I organized my transition bags and now we are headed out to swim in Hayden Lake!
I also uploaded more images to my Picasa web album, check the links on the side of the blog

IRONKIDS race!

2007-06-21T20:17:00.000-07:00

Jacob and Alex did the Iron Kids fun run tonight and it was great. I ran with Alex and he did the full 1K run without walking. They got medals and water bottles when they crossed the line.

The kids also made signs, went swimming, walked on the boardwalk and we had dinner before running the kids race, after the race we came back to the hotel and went on the bumper boats and played in the arcade. What a long, GREAT day!

Thursday Morning Swim

2007-06-21T11:51:00.000-07:00

I may have to rethink my estimates... Swimming into whitecaps sure changes how long it takes to swim. 1 lap this morning took over 48 minutes and boy o boy was it tough headed out. Coming back in was just a little easier but not much. No fun hitting a wave when you're trying to breathe.

Looking down the middle of the course.

Time for lunch!

We Made It!

2007-06-20T18:32:00.000-07:00

We got up early loaded, robeks, starbucks and on road by 7 am. The kids did great, first stop was almost 3 hoursin up on top of Snoqualamie Pass, just a quick break and back on the road, next stop was not until Moses Lake for lunch. We found a great park right off the freeway.

Next stop was a great visit with Uncle Pat at RiversidePark in downtown Spokane, Aunt Pam came by after work and we got underway. Getting settled in. Dinner and soon will hit the wave pool and water slides that are part of the hotel.

Some fun at the park

Final countdown

2007-06-18T08:53:00.000-07:00

Jacob, Alex and I set out on Friday for a boys only camp out, we didn't go far, about 7 miles south of Bellingham is Larabee State Park but even so Alex fell asleep in the car on the way. That turned out to be a good thing as Jacob and I were able to setup the tent and tarp over the picnic table. Alex woke up about the time we were finishing and I started to inflate our air mattresses.

We had nice fireside chats, hot dogs on a stick, s'mores, scary stories, hikes and a visit from mom on Saturday too. Lots of fun!

It was nice to relax with the kids and not spend half the weekend exercising. Not much planned this week, just a couple real short quick runs, swims and bikes just to keep loose and also to ease some stomach nerves as it gets closer.

We depart early Wednesday morning and please do keep checking the blog as I plan to update most every day.

844

2007-06-14T07:29:00.000-07:00

is my lucky number for June 24th at least! You can use it to track me online during the race, more details to follow including URLs for the live video feed so you can watch me too!

Less than 10 days left, I'm ready, just need to get some rest and travel in.

Jacob, Alex and I are going camping this weekend and then 2 days of work and we are off for Coeur d'Alene!

Time to TAPER!

2007-06-04T07:43:00.000-07:00

I did my last long ride yesterday in the sun, what a great day!

I rode with Kevin out to meet Pat and we did a nice loop back into Bellingham and south to ride around Lake Samish before heading up and over Yew street back past Lake Whatcom, dropping Kevin off and refilling water, I continued with Pat to drop him off near his place and then I repeated the first loop.

I wanted to ride a two loop ride and it worked out great as Kevin was looking to get in about 3 hours and Pat 3-4 hours and I was hoping for 6. I think we all got real close to our goals for the ride.

I finished my last long ride at 5:50 and 94 miles followed by a short 30 minute run. It was sunny and hot. I expect some heat for the IRONMAN so this is good. I took my electrolyte tablets and had no issues on the bike or (more importantly) the run. The last hour and half of the bike I was ready to be done biking.

Now I taper, over the next 3 weeks I will reduce the lengths of my training sessions, but not the intensity, if anything I might pickup the intensity a bit.

May was my biggest month ever

2007-06-01T09:10:00.000-07:00

This past month I swam almost 15 miles, ran another 115 and biked almost 600 miles all in about 65 hours of training.

Spending a few days in Couer d'Alene with others was awesome and the business trip made for a slight recovery week, but I feel ready. One last long ride this Sunday and then I will officially begin my taper.

Got an email from North America Sports (The people who run the IRONMAN in Couer d'Alene) that the bib numbers will be announced on June 8th!

Weekend to Remember

2007-05-28T19:24:00.000-07:00

Got back real late from Pismo Beach on Friday night, so naturally stayed up a bit later getting settled.

Went in Lake Whatcom for the first time on Saturday morning and boy o boy was it cold, I have no idea what the temp was, but think it will be close to what we get in Lake Coeur d'Alene. I wore my new swim booties and it certainly did help and once I got moving and generating some heat it wasn't too bad. I'm sure the guys fishing were looking at me a bit funny, but I got training to do. The condos out at the end of the lake tore down the gazebo but I still swam two loops to the gazebo and back. Actually, you can see the old railroad bed at the bottom of the lake and that is where I turn around, so don't need the gazebo anymore, but it was nice to site off of.

Saturday afternoon had me riding the Ski to Sea mountain bike course as it is only open to pre ride the one day from noon to 4:00 and we got to Hovander Park about 3:30 so we had to hurry, at least to get past the one section that goes over private land. Very nice flat course, with three bridges that you have to get off and push, carry, pull, or whatever to get your bike under and over the obstacles. Once past the bridges the course goes down to the beach and is a combination of river sized rocks and sandy sections, not a spot to ride, so I carried a bit and pushed through the sandy sections. Back on dry land, we weave our way through the waterfront area to Zuanich Park to tag our kayaker, but today was just a test run. I get to do the real thing on Sunday.

I was planning a run Sunday morning, but slept in and took it easy for a little while. I left about 11 am to meet John and carpool out to Hovander for the biker meeting at noon. Got my bike inspected and got the low down on the ins and outs and the rules of the race.

Then I waited... and waited... and waited...

While I was waiting, I was able to hold John's bike as his canoe team came in pretty early and he was off, I held another acquaintances bike for him and as I was waiting around a bit more I saw a couple co-workers doing the mountain bike course for their teams. Jody was going to hold my bike as I heard my number called (that meant Nancy and Wendy were already under the Fairhaven bridge WOW!).

As I got my bike up to the loading area, Jody was going to hold it but once I was on the beach I heard his number called, so per our agreement he was going to leave it where I set it down.

Before I knew it Nancy and Wendy were in sight, I went to the beaching area and they had another team in the way but they came right in and I stepped into my mid calf deep and grabbed the boat and pulled it up onto the beach as Wendy and Nancy got out. Per our pre race talk I started running with the boat and they were going to carry the back, but they just got finished rowing for two hours and I was running a bit fast, so we had a couple missteps and drops, and Nancy actually fell right at the end, but I was under the exchange banner so I was off and running to my bike.

Swiped the timing chip and off on the course. The first part is on grass through Hovander park to get up onto the river dike which is part gravel and part packed dirt, with overgrown side grasses and bushes the whole way. I had passed a couple and was about to pass another but the first bridge came up so is kinda first in and no passing while under, once under and back up on the dike you have to lift your bike over a cable blocking access to the dike, not fun with a 35-40 pound monster steel mountain bike.

Back underway I quickly made a couple more passes and then there were a few diversions to avoid some sink holes and then the next bridge, this bridge has huge rocks underneath so I carried my bike over my head this time, ug!

Passed a couple more as we transitioned from this bridge to through the private property up onto Marine drive and back towards Bellingham, this road section can be fast, but it felt like I had a flat, it didn't look like a flat, so I kept on slugging away, man it was hard. I kept this up for about 5 minutes (maybe one mile) and had most all those people I passed come up and pass me. I started to hear some noises so I stopped and as it turns out my rear brakes were rubbing and that is tough to do with cantilever brakes, once side got lodged under (over?) the rim and up next to the spokes. It took a couple really tough tugs and pulls but I got it loose and was off and underway again.

I passed about 5 or 6 people on the road section, but we were only on the road for a bit and then we had to carry our bikes over a road barrier and back under a bridge, this bridge has a 14 inch pipe you need to lift your bike over and then onto a short (100 yard) section of gravel path down to the beach section and I was actually able to pass a few on this section as well.

Back on solid ground I was off and into the parking lot and pulled out the timing chip to hand to my kayaker and man was it fun!

Not counting the time I was stopped I don't think anyone passed me and I counted a total of about 10 that I passed. Looking at the results online, our team was 212th out of 425+ teams, we were 12th out of 49 in our division (recreational mixed - rec and must have 4 women). I was 4th out of those 49 mountain bikers, not bad for my first experience with the Ski to Sea!

What a weekend to remember!

Oh yeah, I got a 90 mile 5:30 ride today with John, Mike and Scott! Great ride as we rode Chuckanut Drive south to Samish Island and then headed towards Laconner to turn before we go there to head east and north up Colony road towards Lake Samish and then back into town as we all split up and headed home.

Pismo Beach pics

2007-05-28T19:22:00.000-07:00

I put a few of my pictures from my business trip to Pismo Beach here

Hello from Pismo!

2007-05-21T20:08:00.000-07:00

I'm in Pismo Beach this week for work. I hope to get in some workouts, mostly swimming and running as there is no bike available.

I did get in a good bike ride with my friend Pat on Sunday, we did the loop out to Birch Bay, Semiahmoo, Blaine and into Lynden. It was tough as I was still feeling tired from my training camp, it was a tough 79 miles in just over 5 hours.

No pool here at the hotel in Pismo, so I drove up to San Luis Obispo and swam in an outdoor pool, pretty neat. I'll post some pictures of the beach and the Hearst castle soon.

Ironman Training Camp Day 4 and Wrap up

2007-05-17T06:49:00.000-07:00

Today is the day, the day to see the entire bike course all 112 miles of it. I got up about 6:30 and started loading up some stuff into my car as I was planning on checking out and driving home after the long bike ride. Took a little while because I brought way to much stuff, mostly all my wet riding gear that went unused as the weather was great for the entire camp. Left the gear I was going to ride in inside the room and went to breakfast. (its still worth what we pay for it)

Got underway about 8:20 or so to all drive to CDA this time (no riding the 40 minute ride there to start a 112 mile ride).

Everyone got their bikes out and shoes on and were just generally getting ready to go. We took a group photo and set out just after 9 am (9:08 to be exact).

What a beautiful morning, not too much wind but it was warm and getting hotter. We were pretty close on the first section through a residential area, but once on the centenial trail out to the first turn around it started getting thinned out. Made the turn around and started back into town. Cal and Luke (our coaches) were great they were out chalking the course and setting up aid stations for us throughout the day.

Once back in town we made a little detour to the official route because Government Way is so busy, we turned up 15th street and made out way north. What a great decision, very little traffic and only a couple of lights and stop signs.

Now out into Hayden Lake area we started the climbs again. I was riding close to a few fast riders and would see them up the hill ahead of me and then once I'd make it to the top it seemed like they were gone, but I'd see them on the next climb (way up in front of me).

I skipped a couple aid stations and stopped 4 times during the ride. I passed some faster riders at an aid station and they'd get me after a while.

After completing the loop once and back along the lake I made a facility stop and then passed the faster riders taking a break at the higgins point turn around, they caught me at the next aid station where our special needs bags were. I switched out my bottles for the couple I had in my special needs bag and took a little break. I think these breaks will help in the race too as I found myself a little refreshed and could feel my toes once again. After about 4-5 minutes I was back on course and headed up 15th street back into the county.

The hills hurt a little more the second loop but I was still going up them at an ok pace, until my toes started to hurt too much, I'd really feel it on the climb and then wouldn't really want to pedal on the downside, so I lost some time there. I'm going to do my next long ride in my other bike shoes and see if it makes a difference.

Finally made it out the where Lukes aid station was and took another nice 5 minute rest, refueled, re-filled my water, and had some good conversation. Both Cal and Luke are great!

Luke was at the corner where we go on an out and back section about 15-17 miles long and my feet were fine for the first 10-12 miles, but really started up again coming back up the hill to the aid station so I stopped again for another 5 minute stop and some coke.

Back underway felt great as I saw 93 miles at the aid station so it meant I had less than 20 to go and it is south which is always downhill right? My feet/toes did ok all the way back into town. I had to make one stop though as I stopped when my GPS hit the 100 mile mark. My first century so I had to take a picture, what a great feeling.

Rolled into the parking lot and was off the bike and had my running shoes on pretty quick. Boy o boy was it a nice feeling to be in the running shoes and not the cycling shoes anymore and I think I ran a bit too quick for my tranistion run, but I'm not complaining.

Total bike ride was 106.4 miles and 6:18:25 moving time (does not include the muliple rests).
Extrapolatingg out I think I can do the 112 in 6:30 moving time (with my race wheels) and add 15-20 minutes of breaks so am thinking a 6:45-7:00 IRONMAN bike ride is in the cards for me.
I was extremly salty looking but felt great, so think my nutrition was good.

I jumped in the lake and wipped off most the salt and changed and was in the car for the next six hours, found the perfect exit for coming west, exit 221 in Ritzville has a Shell, McDonalds and a Starbucks so I stopped at all three. Made one more stop along the way and got home right at 11 pm, what a great long day!

I must say that Cal ran an awesome camp, excellent training and on course support, marking the route making sure no one got too lost. It really was great, I hope to do it again someday.

If anyone has a chance to go to a Critical Speed training camp (he puts on a few a year) do it, you will get good training, great support and meet some awesome people. http://www.criticalspeed.com/

Ironman Training Camp Day 3

2007-05-15T12:12:00.000-07:00

Another day to sleep in was nice. We didn't meet this morning until 9 am to carpool up to Liberty Lake. We met at the swimming pool to get into even bigger cars because of limited parking. We went to someones house on the lake and all got ready and wet suited up and pretty soon we were all wet. It wasn't too cold but it was a little choppy due to some wind. We followed the shore line and at the south end turned and followed some bouys towards a little county park where we all stopped and rested a bit. It took me about 29 minutes to get there and the wind and chop was much worse on the way back as we were going into it now. I cut off a big corner and it even with that it took longer to get back. A nice good hour and 5 minute swim. I was happy to get back in some open water as it is different than in a pool.

We took a short rest and not a lot of lunch because we were meeting to do a long run on the course. We all met out front to carpool down to the transistion area and then we set off.

I'm glad we had a guide because the run does wind itself through a residential area in a wierd way. We actually run west towards Spokane first and then back, this little out and back took about 16 minutes and is going to be great in the event because I get to run around the city park so often and the beach was great I think the kids will have lots to do during the day.

Back in downtown CDA we head out through the residential area and finally onto the lakeshore drive that winds its way around Lake Coeur d'Alene. We had our first aid station and refilled my water and got a baggie of gummy worms to take along on the run. It was hot and I drank plenty of water and took my electrolyte tablets on the half hour and was feeling fine, so fine I think it may of bugged some other runners as my heart rate alarm kept going off as I wanted to run abit faster. Getting the alarm helps to keep me at the correct training level so I would back off until the alarm stopped. We hit a second aid station along the lake just about where we did the mile repeats and I ran past because I was still good on fluids.

I hit the turn around and back to the aid station along the lake and refueled and was off into the heat again. Back past the other aid station they had setup for us and through the residential area into the city park where the transistion will be was exactly 13.1 miles.

I skipped the first out and back and just turned around and ran back to the first aid station and back to downtown for a 17.75 mile run on a very hot day. I think this will help come race day.

I soaked in the lake for a bit and then we all walked to a nice italian restaurant and then back for the evening presentation from the medical director of the race (he has also been the med director for other IRONMAN races around the world, works for the Seahawks and has done 9 IRONMAN races himself)

WHAT A GREAT PRESENTATION!

He talked about what to watch out for and that we actually drink too much on the course and to not take anti inflamitories on race day as well as how much and when we should be drinking. He also said it would be better to finish a little dehydrated rather than having too much water in your system.

Tomorrow is a big day, we ride the full course and it is supposed to be hot!

Ironman Training Camp Day 2

2007-05-14T15:29:00.000-07:00

We were able to sleep in as our first activity today was starting at 9 am, so I slept in till 7 and got dressed and me and my roomie went down for our free breakfast. I skipped the sausage this time and think it was a good idea, too greasy for exercise.

After breakfast and getting cycling gear on we all met out front at 8:45 for our 9 am departure, we rode the 10 miles from the hotel (in Post Falls) to Coeur d'Alene which took about 42 minutes or so, this whole ride was supposed to be a recovery ride from yesterdays big day.

We stopped at City Park in downtown Coeur d'Alene and I must say this whole place is very nice, it is going to be a great event.

We set out on an easy group ride of the whole bike course, all 56 miles of it.

The first section is an out and back along Lake Coeur d'Alene and the views and road are great, not a lot of climbing through here, but there were a couple smallish ups and downs. This road is a dead end and we go to the end, the road is closed during the event. Our support vehicle met us at the turn around and we all ate and drank some snacks and such.

Our guide got a flat on this section back to CDA, he got in the support vehicle while we rode into CDA and once in CDA we made a quick stop at the bike store to fix our guides flat.

We rode north from here towards Hayden Lake through some beautiful neighborhoods and some busy shopping areas, but once past downtown Hayden lake we made our way around the north west side of Hayden Lake itself and this is where it started to get a little hilly, nothing to bad at all, but lots of hills, more rollers as once you got to the top it was a quick down and then it seemed like on another climb. We made another support stop and then more rollers.

The route works itself around to a turn around near highway 95 and then back the way we came to a point, they throw one extra loop in to get some more hills (or miles probably) and instead of riding past Hayden Lake, we head more directly into the city of Hayden Lake.

We made it back to City Park in downtown CDA and then back on the centennial trail back to the hotel. The one loop was 54.84 miles (we did skip one little out and back along Northwest Road which is very very busy and will be closed on race day) in 3:30, my watch measured about 882 feet of climbing on the one loop and we do it twice in the race, so not too bad at all.

This ride was supposed to be done and back at the hotel by about 1, we got back at 3, our hill repeats were supposed to start at 3. Everyone is eating now and I made myself a sandwich in the room and will go see what we are doing next...

IMCDA Training Camp Day 1 - Swim Bike Run

2007-05-13T13:40:00.000-07:00

Got up early to meet in the lobby to carpool to the pool. The pool was in a sports club and had lots of chlorine, but was still water, we split into 4 lanes and then 5. We did a nice little ladder set with some all out 25's in between. Took about an hour and was a good workout. We cut it a little short (not the expected hour and half) to get back to the hotel before the breakfast was over. Got back in time and had the free breakfast (Eggs, Hash browns, Sausage and muffin) very nice for the price.

Just enough time to settle down and change into bike gear and we met in the lobby at 10 for a 2 to 3 hour ride with some hill repeats. We were following part of the old IMCDA bike course with some nice diversions to get in some extra hills. We just set on out and the hills decided the order of the day, some faster riders went right up while others took their time. I was in the middle and got this nice shot on the first up/down at the top before heading down.

We continued west towards Washington State and we made it from one state to the next (I think its neat at least) and did a little lollipop and headed back the way we came, the old IMCDA course would come back along the Centennial Trail, but we went right back up the hills including the 500 foot 1.3 mile climb. This time the field was much more spread out.

Still heading back towards the hotel we went right past it and all the way up and down into Coeur d'Alene turning around on highway 95 overlooking the CDA resort (pictured).

Back up and on the way back to the hotel seemed quicker, but another camper and I were the final riders who did both hill repeats and all the way into CDA along the hilly route. Some took the centennial trail and went around the hills.

Finally back at the hotel with these totals: 42.07 miles 2:50 and about 2227 feet of climbing.

A little downtime and then we will meet at 2:30 to carpool to Coeur d'Alene for 8 to 10 1 mile running repeats.

After driving out to Coeur d'Alene we followed Coach Cal through town along the run course as it winded its way through some pretty nice neighborhoods. Didn't look too bad, I drove with my roommate and he has done IMCDA in the past and was giving some pretty good tips and such, we got out of town to the turn around point to do some mile repeats, we started at the turn around which is about half way up a hill. The idea was to run 1 mile at your stand alone half marathon pace and then rest 2 minutes. We ran down to the bottom and along the trail to the 1 mile mark and it was nice to run kinda fast down hill, waited around and then was off back up to the turn around, it was tougher, but nothing like any of the trail runs I run on. rest and repeat or is it rinse and repeat. Grabbed some gel and water at the top where Cal had setup and aid station.

I did 4 loops for about 8 miles, very nice. As we drove back through Coeur d'Alene and on the freeway we got caught in a rainstorm, but were in the car so not bad at all, no rain during any of our training.

Off to dinner and evening presentation and some sleep.

IMCDA Camp Day 0 - Arrival

2007-05-12T21:29:00.000-07:00

I left Bellingham about 9:15 this morning and was such a nerd that I decided to time myself and hit the stop watch, I needed some gas and as it turns out I had enough to get to Bothell and even better the gas station I stopped at was in the same parking lot as the Brooks Outlet store, so I stopped and got some running shorts and a nice lightweight waterproof jacket, very nice.

Back on the road and going up and over Snoqualamie pass was nice and there was a bit of snow in places, none on the road or even on the side of the road, perfect place up on the hills. I had thought about stopping but was making good time and continued right over the top. I was getting hungry though and stopped at the next rest stop (Indian John Hill MP 89) used the facilities and made myself a sandwich and was back on the road.

I was trying to keep up on my hydration and needed to stop soon thereafter, I skipped the next rest stop and made it to the rest stop (Schrag MP 198) with this great view of vast acres of farmland, very nice.

I made it into Spokane to visit Aunt Pam and Uncle Pat about 3:00, but this was the same time that Aunt Pam has a Faith and Light service and potluck so Uncle Pat met me at the church so I could at least say hello to Aunt Pam and then Uncle Pat and I visited and walked around the Gonzaga campus.

I was back on the road about 4:30 as I wanted to get checked in and find out where I was going to get LT tested. Got checked in and still didn't see where Ben had set himself up. I finally found him in a conference room and got my bike a gear down there.

After he poked my finger for some blood and a base LT level, I was up and running, well spinning, the compu-trainer (bicycle trainer that hooks up to a computer and is controlled by the computer) was set at a pretty easy 100 watt level for a warm up, every 4 minutes he upped the wattage and took another poke for some blood, not too bad, but it did get harder and harder and once over the LT threshold, he kept going as I also had a breathing apparatus on to test my VO2 Max level. It got pretty tough, but that's the idea to see how high your body can work.

My LT was (is) a little low (131 HR), but can be trained to up it and now that I know the number I can target my training a bit better to increase the LT. My VO2 max (169) could go up just a bit too, but the coach said it would be better to train to increase the LT.

After a quick shower we all met for some dinner and then a brief meeting to let us know to meet at 7:00 am in the lobby to go swim! We will also get a 2 hour bike and 8-10 mile repeats.

More tomorrow...

Training Camp details

2007-05-09T07:36:00.000-07:00

The itinerary for my upcoming IRONMAN training camp came in the mail yesterday. I sure am looking forward to this, it will be a great chance to ride and preview the course, check my fitness levels and get in some great training as well.

I will drive from Bellingham on Saturday May 12 to Spokane for a visit with Aunt Pam and Uncle Pat before heading onto Post Falls for the first group dinner and to meet everyone. There is a chance I can get my Lactate Threshold tested that night too.

Sunday May 13

7:30am: Coached Swim Session until 9:00 (Maybe Open Water swim in Liberty Lake)
9.45am: Breakfast and Meeting at the Templins
11.00am: 3 hour bike ride on Hilly section of Old Bike Course
2:30pm: Transport to Run Course
3.00pm: Run 90 minutes Mile Repeats 8-10 X 1 mile on run course with2' rest
5.00pm: Group Dinner
7.00pm: Evening presentation - Luke Way - Bike Fitting / Calvin Zaryski Final Physiological Preparation for the Ironman Race

Monday May 14

7.30am: Breakfast at Templins
9:00am: Bike IM Course One Loop
1:00pm: Lunch at Templin's or nearby
2:30pm: Bike another 2 hours Hill Climb Intervals
6:00pm: Group Dinner
7.00pm: Evening activity: Swim Stroke Review: Common Mistakes and Bike maintenance and changing a flat tire!!

Tuesday May 15

7:00am: Breakfast at Templins Hotel
8:15am: Drive to Pool/Lake Swim Session until 10:00
10:30am: Drive Back to Templins Hotel
11:00am: Small Lunch then transport to Run start
1:00am: Long Run on Course (2-3 hours)
4.30pm: Group Dinner
7.30pm: Evening Presentation: Dr. PZ Pearce will outline some of the medical implications when racing the Ironman. As the Medical Director of the Ironman, he will outline some case studies from previous races and present some solutions so you are ready for anything on race day.

Wednesday May 16

7:30am: Breakfast at the Templins Hotel
8:30am: Meet with run gear ready for bike/run transition
9:00am Ride Ironman Bike Course (180km), Transition into 5km run,start of Ironman Run Course.... long day!!
6:00pm: Group Dinner
7:30pm: Evening Seminar - Final preparations before race day and some details of what to do on 'Ironman Day'
8.00pm: Questions and Wrap Up

Depending on how I feel after the long ride/run on Wednesday I may head home after a quick shower to be able to get back to work on Thursday, but as you can see this is quite a bit of training and I may just want to sleep and relax and just get up early Thursday for the drive home.

Keep checking back all week as I hope to have Internet access at the hotel and want to post pictures and my thoughts each day of camp.

WWU Triathlon V

2007-05-06T18:37:00.000-07:00

I was skipping out on my planned 6 hour bike ride to do an event that I have done the past three years. This is a fun event put on by the Western Washington University Cycling team up on the WWU campus.

I woke up early to get some food and ready to go as I was riding my bicycle to the event. After eating a bowl of cereal and reading a bit online I was ready to go. I wore my race gear under my commuting gear and had loaded up my backpack with my transition stuff. The ride up to campus is only about 20 minutes and was a nice warm up, although (as usual) I was very early and it wasn't really a warm up after all.

I found a nice transition area right on the edge of a rack in the middle and setup my bike and towel with my shoes, hat, race belt and more all laid out and ready to go. OK, time to walk around and chit chat and wait. This race has grown and grown, in 2004 when I first ran this event they had 56 finishers. I saw over 120 registered for today's race and lots of my friends and fellow Bellingham Triathlon Club members either do this race or volunteer so I had lots of people to visit and chit chat with. My friend Pat had arrived even before me and had a very nice spot picked out on the closest bike rack to the transition entrance/exit. He has been riding with me on some of these long training rides and it sure has helped. My last 5 hour ride (without Pat) seemed longer and harder.

Swim
It is a pool swim this time of year around here and we swim up and down each of the six lanes ducking under the lane lines each time. This makes for a 300 yard swim that snakes itself from one side of the pool to the other. The swimmers are sent 15 seconds apart and if everyone gave an accurate swim estimate you shouldn't have to pass anyone or get passed yourself. I estimated a 5:45 swim and the two in front of me were missing (more on that later) so I didn't have to worry about passing anyone and as it turns out the second person behind me was about to pass just as I was getting out of the water in 5:29 for a 1:52/100 average. Very happy swimmer here!

T1
As you run out of the pool there is a very pleasant gravel path you must run down to get to the transition area. I choose to skirt the edge and actually run in the bark and bushes. Once past the slivers I was on soft grass and on my knees to put on my socks, yeah I like to wear socks, some go barefoot to save the few seconds, but I go with socks. As I was putting the shoes on with one hand I put on my sunglasses, as I put on the other shoe I slipped on my helmet. I also decided on putting my jacket on due to the cold, this took a few extra seconds but I think it helped on the bike. T1 took 1:55 (from just exiting the water until actually on the bike).

Bike
The bike is off campus but you head right out Bill Macdonald Parkway as it curves around the new campus parking and information building. This road has a brief down and then up section followed by a nice long downhill where you can really pickup some speed, but watch out as the turn at the bottom is like a 120 degree turn, much more than 90 but not so much that you are riding back where you came from. This road heads south and is pretty flat and easy to pick off slower swimmers. One by one I kept on passing. A couple more turns and then its generally back towards campus but rather than taking the main road (which is busy but flat) we go up 14th street and back down to the main road and once again rather than sticking on this main drag we are sent up and over a section just to get back onto the busy road a little farther down the way. This has taken past the north side of campus, so we turn off this main drag up and back towards campus with some more ups in there for good measure. Rather than going the short way back to the transition area we are sent past campus (from the north to the south this time) almost to Fairhaven again. This section is generally downhill but once again we turn onto a road simply to get an up and then a down. This down is not that great as it is one city block down to a left turn. I was riding the brakes most of the way. Finally we are back on the main drag into the transition but this is a 4 block ride up, so not a lot of speed here (for me at least). Once on the crest and pretty flat into transition I slowed to take my feet out of my shoes but leave them on the bike. I set my feet onto the top of the shoes so I don't need to do this in transition. I think I may of slowed too much, but oh well. This 9 mile loop took me 29 minutes flat for an 18.58 MPH.

T2
Since I was already out of my shoes I was able to very quickly get going, had a little trouble putting the bike back on the rack, but once on had my shoes and race belt on in less than 46 seconds.

Run
The run is brutal at the start as once you leave transition it is straight up hill, up to the top of the ridge past all the dorms (where I used to live many years ago, as did my mom). I was going at a nice clip, but my HR kept on going up and up and finally had to walk for a few seconds to catch my breath and slow down. Got going again and turned the corner to run downhill for the next mile or so almost to downtown, but I think they just have us run that far down to have to turn around and run back up. Once at the bottom, we turn and it is another of those straight up deals, but was able to keep it going up and over the top. One more turn and then its the road up into campus and once on campus we run right past Old main, but not red square along the back of some buildings to get onto a trail I used when I lived on the south side of campus. I love trail running and was able to pickup some more speed here. All this back and forth around campus makes for a very nice event I think. Once out of the trail a short section and turn along a busy road for 1 block and then it is a straight shot to the finish, up hill finish that is. I was VERY happy with my (listed) 3.5 mile run in 22:49 or 6:31 per mile.

Overall was a little bummed that I missed the one hour mark. but not too bummed as I only missed it by 1 second. Yeah 1:00:01 total time. The official time was listed as 59:31, remember those two swimmers ahead of me who didn't make it, I think I got a 30 second head start, but I'm going off my time splits from my watch and am VERY happy with my 1 hour time, although if I didn't put on the jacket, or slow down as much to get my feet out of my cycling shoes, or... Yeah I hope I can break 1 hour next year, something to shoot for.

April Update

2007-05-01T08:46:00.000-07:00

April showers came and went, but I think I left a mark too, or at least my bike seat did. I'm getting out on the bike more and more. Last Sunday I had a 5 hour 15 minute ride and I must say I'm pretty sick of gels. I'm going to find some 'solid' food to have on the bike and try to leave the gels for the run. When I did the Seattle Marathon and the Chukcanut 50K I remember not wanting anymore gels.

I read an article last week in Triathlete magazine about starting the bike in a caloric deficit (due to the 2.4 mile swim) and then the 6 plus hour bike ride will burn about 5000-6000 calories and then the marathon will burn another 3500-4500. So I need to eat on the bike and the run or else I won't be able to finish. The human body can absorb or process about 350-400 calories an hour (some more, some less) so that is what I am planning to eat per hour on the bike and run. These training sessions are not just for fun, but I am also dialing in my nutrition as that is a very important part of a successful IRONMAN.

My April totals:

Weights
3:57:40

Swim
11:04:54
17.19 miles

Bike
29:39:16
467.92 miles

Run
14:16:27
96.75 miles

Trail runners

2007-04-28T11:19:00.000-07:00

I met a few of the trail runners I used to run Sunday's with for a photo shoot. One of our group is a writer (check out his blog and books here) and has an article going into the Seattle Sunday paper soon and needed some photos. It sure was great to see and talk to everyone again. I really miss Johns one liners and Mike edging him on and pretty soon everyone gets into it, what fun.

Friday I took half a day off from work to get in a brick workout as Saturday was Alex's first T-Ball game, Debbies guitar lesson and Jacobs soccer game. I spent Friday afternoon getting wet. I rode my bike to the pool in the rain and I swam 4000 yards in about 1:20 and since it was still raining pretty good my 1 hour bike was very wet too. The rain kept coming down on my run too. There gets to a point where you are so wet you don't even notice the rain too much anymore. Great workout:
Swim 1:20 4000 yards
Bike 1:04 16 miles
Run 0:45 5.6 miles

Going Long(er)

2007-04-23T08:08:00.000-07:00

I hit all my key long workouts this past week.

Thursday night I ran for just over 2 hours. Debbie and the kids dropped me off at the trail head to Galbraith Mountain which is about a 20 minute run from the house, but my goal was only 2:15 and this extra 20 minutes was going to put me over (or so I thought). As it turns out, I must of been flying as I made it up to the top and back down in about 1:35 so on the run back to the house I added a detour down to Haggens and then up a little trail that follows Barkley called the Klipsun trail. Great run, beautiful clear blue skies. On top of Galbraith you see far and wide.

Saturday morning I went to the pool to get a long swim in. My goal was the IRONMAN distance (4225 yards) or 1:30 whichever came first. I did my long swim workout which is a ladder, where I swim 100 yards, then pull swim 200, swim 300, pull 400 and keep alternating until the distance is met or time goal. I made the distance under the 1:30 again, but this time I took a little less rest and was swimming a bit faster so only took me 1:25:18 to swim the 4250 (25 extra yards so I didn't have to get out on the wrong side of the pool).

Sunday morning I left the house at 6:15 to meet my friend Pat at about 6:45 in between our houses. We went west into Ferndale and North onto Birch Bay. Riding though BB in the 'off' season is quite nice, not very many people yet and the views are great. The tide was all the way up as we rode all along the waterfront and around the North point into Semiamhoo and past into downtown Blaine. Blaine was very empty at about 8:15 on a Sunday morning, which is one reason we meet so early on Sunday mornings to avoid as much traffic as possible. We rode East out of Blaine along H road which parallels the international border. This road is very long, hilly and straight all the way to SR 539 (also known as Guide Meridian). We turned north and rode about a quarter mile on SR 539 and stopped at the duty free store to use the facilities and stretch out a bit. From here we continued East along a road called Borderline Road. Next week I'll take my camera as this road has a ditch on the north side of the road, the ditch is maybe 3-5 feet deep (it looks like a drainage ditch), but on the other side is another road, but that road is in Canada, no fence, but lots of camera towers, I'm sure we were being watched. We followed this road as it curved to the South into Lynden and onto the Hannegan road back home, Pat turned on Wiser Lake Road and I kept on going south. Looking at my training logs, this was my longest ride ever in terms of time and distance (4:43 and 76.8 miles). It only rained on us for about 15 minutes.

Another busy week coming up, Alex starts T-Ball this Saturday!

March Update

2007-04-12T12:59:00.000-07:00

A little late, but oh well...

Over 50 hours of training during March. As you can see I am scaling back on the gym workouts and getting out on the bike more. My longest bike ride has been 4 hours and over the next few weeks I will build up to 6 to 6 and half hour rides. I plan to get 3 or 4 6 plus hour rides in. Its crunch time, a few 18 hour weeks planned.

All about the Keys

2007-04-02T08:32:00.000-07:00

Key workouts are the important workouts in any training program and very important working and building towards an IRONMAN.

My key workouts are the long bike rides, the long runs, and long swims, followed by bricks, everything else is in support of these key workouts and overall fitness.

I got in two key workouts this weekend.

Scheduled for Saturday was a brick, but not just any bike/run brick, this was a full swim/bike/run session. The swim was scheduled for 1:30 and I had never swam more than 1:15 or so. So for me, the key part of this brick was not so much the brick, but the swim. I was hoping to swim the IRONMAN distance (4224 yards = 2.4 miles) as well, so I decided that I would swim that distance even if it took longer than the 1:30. Well I swam the distance but I did not get in a full 1:30 swim. The 4250 yards (85 laps) took 1:29:58 so pretty close to 1:30 ;-).

I swam a ladder workout, swimming 100, 200, 300, 400, 500, 600, 700, 800, 650. I alternated swimming and pulling (swimming with a pull buoy between your legs for floatation) and took a total of 1 minute 15 seconds rest. I also do not know how to flip turn so do open turns at the walls. All this, leaves me hopeful to swim the 2.4 in Coeur d'Alene in less than 1:30.

Debbie and the kids dropped me off at the pool after soccer with my bike, so after the swim I put on my bike gear at the pool and headed out for an easy one hour bike ride. I got home and was feeling a bit tired and happy about my swim that I was going to skip the easy 30 minute run, Debbie said at least run a couple miles, your going to be tired at the IRONMAN, so I went out and ran a 3.68 mile course around our neighborhood and was very happy I did after.

My key workout on Sunday was a 3:30 bike ride. I met with Pat again, we met about half way between our houses and this time we headed west towards Ferndale, we rode through Ferndale and headed north towards Birch Bay, but because we were only planning 3:30 we did not go all the way into Birch Bay (will do that this Saturday). We stopped midway to refill our water and then headed back towards home. Getting home at about 10:30 in the morning was perfect timing, about 15-20 minutes after being home and showered, Debbie was getting ready for her run and then the downpour started. We had one 5 minute section on the ride of very light showers, and we just missed this very heavy downpour of rain. As it turns out, Debbie waited about 15 minutes and the rain had passed and was turning to sun.

Easter weekend next Sunday, so Pat and I are planning to meet on Saturday for a 4 hour bike ride, we should make it to Birch Bay this time.

Now it gets fun!

2007-03-25T18:41:00.000-07:00

My rides are starting to get longer and longer now and its great! But first I got in a nice long run on Saturday.

I've moved my long rides to Sunday so I can go to Jacobs soccer games, they were due to start this weekend, but they canceled the game due to all the rain. I did get in a nice 2 hour run on Saturday because the game was canceled. I drove over to run up Galbraith Mountain. I ran up to the top past the towers to run down my favorite trail, the Wonderland Trail. I always enjoy the view from the top of the Wonderland trail, looking East you can see all of Lake Whatcom including Mt Baker in the distance, the entire city of Bellingham to the North, even cities further north, to the West brings in views of the San Juan Islands and your high enough to see over some islands and see that they are truly islands. On this run I couldn't see 50 feet due to the clouds, so much for my view.

There is now art up on top of Galbraith. Kinda weird just running along and seeing this art out in the middle of the forest (the Pink art) or in the middle of a clear cut (the Blue art).

I woke up early Sunday to check the rain and my email to see if a friend and I were going to meet for our bike ride. No rain and no email, so I got all my gear on and headed out at 7 for our 7:30 meeting. Pat left at 7:00 too and as it turns out we were about spot on where we planned to meet in the middle. From there we headed east towards Mt Baker, but turned North at Nugents Corner to head into Everson and onto Lynden. All this under clear skies and not too much wind. I hadn't ridden on these roads, but there was very little traffic and beautiful countryside and scenery, not to mention great conversation. It is very nice to ride with a friend.

Coming around back to where we started, Pat headed on home as did I. I had planned a short transition run, but coming up the last hill on the way home I had decided to not run. I had just put my bike in the garage and on my way into the house when Jacob came out and was all excited as he, Alex and Debbie were headed out for a run (Jacobs rides his bike while Debbie pushes Alex in the stroller) so I went in and got on my running shoes to join them. We ran around Whatcom Falls park. Wow o Wow was there a lot of water coming over the falls, more than I've ever scene. It turned out to be such a nice day we skipped a play we were going to go see and the whole family worked around the yard. We did get a little rain after done in the yard and now it looks blue and sunny again. What a great day!

Check out all the great photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/March2425

Core 4 got er dun!

2007-03-19T10:37:00.000-07:00

These four amazing athletes (and more importantly, good friends) finished the Chuckanut 50k this weekend. John, Scott, Mike and John ran in the rain ALL DAY. The rain started about 6:30 am and did not stop until the evening. I went and watched the start and got a ride up to aid station 3 and 4 (Ridge Trail area) that I was volunteering at for the day. After sending the runners out into the light showers and a quick cup of joe, made our way up to the top of Chuckanut Mountain. We setup the aid station and made PB&J wraps, cut fruit and candy bars into bite sized portions. The first runner came through about 9:45 or so, still raining.

As the runners came up the hill many seemed glad to see us and many just happy for a little break before heading out for one of the toughest sections of the run. This upper loop follows the ridge trail, generally down hill for about 2-3 miles and then turns onto the Lost Lake Trail. This Lost Lake trail can be muddy in the middle of the summer. After days (weeks) of rain and raining all day, I heard it was mud bog after mud bog and I can only imagine how much water and mud they had to run (or walk) through. After suffering through this mudfest, they come around the south side of the mountain, only to have to go up a trail called Chinscraper, due to the grade your chin can scrape the dirt off the trail. I imagine this section, after 250+ runners was very muddy making it extra tough and slippery.

Once finished with Chinscraper they come back to the aid station I was at. Some runners just run past, while others take their time and get another rest before finishing the event. I was surprised to see some runners with pretty clean legs, some were definitely covered in mud, but some found a clean way around or through the mud bogs.

I'm truly inspired by these guys and think very highly of them.

CONGRATULATIONS!

I did get a run in on Saturday, after my duties at the aid station were done, I ran down the ridge trail and the lower Lost Lake trail connecting to the Interurban at Arroyo Park to run back to the finish area at Fairhaven Park. I felt a bit bad getting 'good jobs' and 'well dones' from others on the interurban trail. One person photographing the runners asked me if I was in the race and I said no, she said she didn't think so because I was running to fast. This is at the 30 mile mark for the runners and I had only come down the hill.

I took the day off (from training) on Sunday, Debbie got in a good run and we later went on a family bike ride. We borrowed a trail-a-bike for Alex to ride. His feet just touched the pedals, so couldn't pedal, but could hold on and he LOVED it. We rode around Boulevard Park and think we will get a trail-a-bike for him to grow into.

The Final Four

2007-03-12T14:01:00.000-07:00

Stop filling out your March Madness brackets. I know the Final Four... personally! I ran with them on Sunday morning. John, Mike, Scott and John are the survivors and will be running the Chuckanut 50k next week while the larger portion of our Sunday trail running group are recovering and possibly watching and supporting them on this great run.

We met at Lake Padden in the middle of a wind and rain storm, but once underway and in the trees it was not raining and I didn't even hear much wind. I say it was not raining, but it was not dry, my feet were soaked through within minutes and my shoes and legs were covered in mud minutes after that, but it was fun to be running again with these guys. We ran for less than an hour total. After we met at Starbucks and I thoroughly enjoyed the good stories.

I'll be volunteering at the 50k this year. I volunteered in 2005 at aid station 3/4 and will do the same this year. This aid station is at the top of the mountain, I get to see (and help) the runners not once, but twice, both times after they have climbed Chuckanut Mountain. They go for a 7.5 mile loop after I see them the first time, during that loop they will go around the mountain dropping elevation, coming back up the back side and dropping more elevation only to have to climb back up to the top.

This week is a recovery week for me, so only about 8 hours of exercise planned and lots of rest, I need it. On my plan, I switch from two weight workouts a week to one and really start to ride the bike more and more. While loosing a weight workout I will gain 1-2 bike workouts and 1-2 running workouts each week. Swimming will remain mostly constant at 3 workouts, but I will incorporate a 'longer' swim each week so my time in the pool should be up as well. My biggest weeks have been constant at about 12-13 hours for the week. I will hitting at least an 18 hour week and most of that time is bicycling. I'm looking forward to it!

Good luck and have fun to all the 50k runners this lucky Saturday! I will see you there. I'll be the one in green ;-)

Great Weekend and Monthly Update

2007-03-05T08:56:00.000-08:00

It was a wet and muddy weekend, but I had a very good weekend of training.

I met another triathlete on Satuday morning for my annual ride out to Everson to run in the Honeywagon fun run put on by the GBRC. No rain on the ride out or back, but the roads were wet to whole way. Lots of road grime from all the sand and dirt they put down during the few snow storms we've had this winter. We took it nice and easy on the way out and back. It was great to not be riding in the garage on my trainer.

I wanted to run fast as I was going to run the 4 mile event (last year I ran the half marathon). These events are run on very flat farmland around Everson. I started out fast and at the first mile marker checked my watch and hit 6:31. I kept on moving along and hit 13:04 at the 2 mile mark. I was hopefuly that I could keep up this blistering pace. Just past the two mile mark is the turn, 4 milers turn left and the half marathoners turn right. I was suprise how many half marathoners were running 6:30 miles turned to the right. The field thinned out and I was hopeful to be in the top ten. There was no 3 mile marker and I think that just helped me continue on strong. Being such a flat course it can be difficult to keep the speed, hills even small ones help to break up the pace and let you relax a bit. I just kept trying to maintain my pace. Coming back to the start/finish always gets my adrenalene up another notch and was able to kick around the school to a finish in 25:38 for a 6:25 average pace!

I met up with some of the 50k runners for a muddy run on Sunday morning. They are in the second week of their taper and the planned two hour run was just right for me. We met at the Vet clinic and ran up to the Lost Lake trailhead and back. Boy o Boy was the trail muddy. This is part of the 50k race and will get even muddier after 325 runners come through in a couple weeks. Great run and was great to get back to a run with some friends. The group has gotten smaller due to a lot of injuries this year. We had 10 in our 50k group for last years event and it is down to 4 50k runners this year. Hopefully we will all be back running strong in the future.

February 2007 Recap: 42 hours and 26 minutes of training. My percentages are starting to even out, but I will need to get in more and more cycling so that should continue to rise.

Going Strong

2007-02-24T11:02:00.000-08:00

Still going strong. After last weeks recovery/test week I was able to get in two workouts each day this week except for Thursday and Friday.

My tests last week went great. My swim test on Friday was 3x300 with 30 seconds rest in between. I was able to average 5:27 per 300 (1:49 per 100), which is very fast for me. My bike test was a 5 mile square just north of Bellingham, the sun came out so I was able to do the test outside and on my test route. I completed the 5 mile rectangle in just over 15 minutes about 20 mph. Not too screaming fast but I felt good about the ride this early in the season. I did my run test on Sunday on a track. After warming up I ran 2.77 miles (10 laps in lane 6) in 17:57 or 6:30 per mile. Again this was fast and felt great.

This was a tough week though, Alex got sick last weekend and after a few days of not really eating or drinking was very dehydrated, Debbie took him to his doctors office on Wednesday (21st) this week and he was down 5 pounds (that's over 15% of his body weight - imagine you or I loosing 15%) since his 4 year checkup a few weeks earlier. They had us take him to the hospital. We was put on an IV on Wednesday and spent the night at the hospital with Debbie. Hopeful to come home on Thursday, he still wasn't eating enough so I spent the night with him on Thursday night. He came home Friday and is almost back to his normal kid self.

I did my first 'brick' workout of the year today. A BRICK is a Bike ride followed by a Run, people have come up with the BR -ICK label cause they are tough. I've always been able to quickly get into my running legs after my bike rides and today's first BRICK was the same, I did the bike on the trainer in the garage and had a fairly quick 4 minute transition into dry running clothes and shoes and felt like my normal running legs within a quarter mile or less. For some, this change from biking legs to running legs can take a lot longer, but it is important to get this down because in a triathlon you need to be ready.

Nice and easy 2 hour hilly trail run planned for tomorrow!

New Bike Course for IMCDA

2007-02-13T07:47:00.000-08:00

The new bike course for the Ironman Triathlon in Coeur d'Alene has been posted to the race web site. It can be found here.

The course goes north through Hayden instead of west through Post Falls.

On the bike I ride about 3 blocks from our Hotel 4 times. The course uses the same first out and back section where the riders head south along Lake Coeur d'Alene which is about a 14 mile loop. The large loop goes north and is about a 40 mile lollipop the stick section connects Couer d'alene with Hayden and then the loop is to the north of Hayden. Looks like beautiful countryside up there.

Family Weekend

2007-02-12T10:31:00.000-08:00

I got up early (well normal time for me about 6) on Saturday and rode 2 hours on the trainer before we loaded up and went to the race. I put in my new Spinerval 26.0 Hardcore 100 DVD and did the first two hours of this 5.5 hour workout. Two hours was my plan, but Coach Troy said on the DVD many times that if you start this workout you need to finish, but I didn't have time for all 5.5 hours. I will have to build up to that. I thought the part that I did do was good and am looking forward to extending and possibly finishing the full 5.5 workout.

After finishing my 2 hours, I loaded the car and we went to a running event that the GBRC puts on this time each year called the "Two for the road" where you run with a partner and finish together. Debbie Ran with Jacob and I ran with Alex. Jacob did great finishing the 5k in about 50 minutes, the course runs through Whatcom Falls park and has a nice long downhill, but you have to come back up. Alex did great too, issuing many "Good Job" and thumbs up to lots of other runners from his seat in the stroller. The course is two out and backs so he got to see lots of people and lots of smiles. We were the first Parent/Stroller pair and Alex went up during the awards to get his blue ribbon and a box of candy, he was very surprised and happy to share the candy with the whole family.

After the race we drove to Edgewood to visit and let the kids play with their cousins.

Sunday morning I went for a run, I went from Edgewood down the hill into Puyallup and followed East Main into Sumner and then back up the hill into Edgewood and made my way almost to Milton and back to Debbies parents house. Nice tour of cities. I was hoping for almost 2 hours and took about 1:37. My GPS had troubles so guesstimate about 11.5 miles. I was particularly happy about running with no stops or walks up the hill from "The Cannery" in Sumner to Edgewood.

After showering and an awesome breakfast, we started North to Seattle to visit and exchange birthday gifts at my parents house with my extended family. We were celebrating birthdays ranging from December through March and included Alex, my Grandma, my Dad and my brother Marc. My Mom made a lunch that I remembered from growing up, country style spare ribs, VERY good.

The Durango made it home just about dusk and Debbie and I relaxed while Jacob helped Alex play with his gifts.

Caught the Bug

2007-02-06T10:11:00.000-08:00

Well I had to sit out a couple days this past week because I caught the bug thats going around. Not too bad, stayed home from work one day and in the other, but skipped out on all training for those two days. I think this worked out well.

As part of my training plan I schedule recovery days. These recovery days may not mean total rest and relaxation, but a lighter workout and not as long. It is when you rest and recover when your body can regenerate and actually realize some of the hard work your putting in.

I did get in my key workouts for the week, my long bike and my long run. I got about 2:15 on a nice bike ride with Kevin. We went to Lynden and back at a relatively easy pace. No rain until the final 10-12 miles or so. As I'm out of the 50k, I ran alone and from the house up Galbraith and then down to Haggens and home, just over 2:00, perfect, no pain in my injured area.

January 2007 Recap: 51 hours and 24 minutes of training. As you can see only 18% of my time was on the bike. I need to get more bicycling in. It will come.

Easy Run, My @SS!

2007-01-29T08:17:00.000-08:00

Well this was supposed to be an 'easy' week, with less time and lower intensity prior to a final 3 week build before we taper for the Chuckanut 50K trail run.

Well it was not easy (for me at least) and my injury is still ever present. So much so that it has me re-thinking about actually running the 50k.

We started with the flat Interurban Trail out to run a few of the lower hills of the 50k course. Even on the first section, Fragrance Lake Trail, I had to walk quite a bit. I was able to run most of the $2 trail as it is generally downhill. The next section UP Cleator road was another walk. This was as high as we planned to run so we went down the trail and road back to the Interurban Trail, I was able to run this downhill section and once on the Interurban was able to run most all the way back to the cars, but it hurt.

As the Chuckanut is not my "A" race for this year, I am not going to run the 50k this year. I will be there to cheer and support for my friends.

That hurt

2007-01-22T10:03:00.000-08:00

Took Jacob to Mt baker on Saturday for another snowboard lesson, we got there early and decided to attempt the rope tow and then the chair lift. Jacob couldn't get the rope tow down, but did great on the chair lift, a little trouble getting on, but got off great.

Jacob and I did two runs before his lessons started at 11:30. During his lesson I went up and down a couple times. Lots of nice powder. I only snowboard a couple times a year, but each time I 'feel' it after. It seems to use slightly different muscles than I'm used to.

After his lesson we had a bit of food and headed home. I didn't notice any 'new' muscles until dinner time. I wondered if I would attempt my run planned for Sunday morning. Jogged a bit to get the morning newspaper and felt fine, so decided to go and meet the group.

We planned a route that would hopefully get us about 4 hours. We ran south from the Vet clinic and took the connector up to the Lost Lake trail. Once on the Lost Lake trail we were on the 50k course and the plan was to follow the course all the way around Chuckanut Mountain to the bottom of the $2 trail and then skip Cleator and the Ridge.

Towards the middle of the Lost Lake section where it peaks, I got a bit behind the group as I was starting to feel fatigued and achy in my legs, no real pain yet, but needed to walk some of the hilly section back there. At the peak I was able to run just fine down to the start of chinscraper. I didn't stop, I wanted to get up the trail so the group would not have to wait as long at the top. I new I would be walking a lot of chinscraper. My HR was way up even just walking this section. I looked at my GPS data after and parts of chinscraper range from 17-25 percent grade. You feel like your chin could scrape the trail on the way up.

This tough section was working me over today, I got to the top and still had about 6 inches of snow up there, which made a softer/faster descent down Cleator road.

Coming down I was generally able to keep everyone in view until on Fragrance Lake Road and the faster guys got out of view, I was really feeling some tightness in my legs.

We got down to the bottom and then started up Fragrance Lake trail and must say WOW, I've never thought this lower trail was as tough as chinscraper, but it felt like it. My legs just did not want me to run. So I walked most this section. I was surprised to find the group waiting for me. I hoped they didn't wait long and told them to not wait at the next stop (they did - what a great group).

Even in lots of pain, I was able to run most of the $2 trail because it is generally flat to downhill. At the end we just had about 4 miles to get back to the cars, I started to run down Cleator road to the Interurban Trail, but running was pretty much out of the question by now. I had to walk down the road. Once on the flat IU I was able to run for about 5 minutes and then needed to walk. I walked quite a bit, ran some when I started feeling a bit better, but didn't last long, maybe 3-4 minutes max at a time, with at least that much walking.

This was just like the end of the 50k last year where I just couldn't run back. I had a little pain in the same spot as I had in the 50k and am seeing a PT for now, but my calf's were very close to cramping up and my upper legs (I think) were really dead from snowboarding.

I took my electrolytes on a same schedule I had been doing before, 2 about every 30 minutes. I think I may of missed or extended a bit, but think I took enough. Maybe not though, I had salt streaks around my eyes and chin. So maybe a combination of not enough electrolytes and sore muscles from snowboarding.

Next Sunday is a lower intensity run with less time planned as our last 'easy' week before getting into the final 3 week build of runs planned for 4, 4.5 and 5 hour runs.

White Sand

2007-01-14T17:05:00.000-08:00

As we were running up cleator road, someone said it was like running on sand, so for the rest of today's run I was running on a white sandy beach.

Ok we weren't really on sand, but the snow was white, soft and grainy like a sandy beach. We met a little earlier than normal to carpool to the start of our run, we got to the parking lot and it was closed, so we turned around. Really we did, to a parking spot on the side of the road a bit closer to town.

We headed up right away, no warmup needed in 17 degree weather. Right up Fragrance Lake trail. The toughest part here was just going straight up without any warmup. The parks deparment keeps these lower high use trails pretty clean, but there were still a few logs to climb over, nothing too bad. Fragrance Lake was frozen, but I wasn't going to test how frozen.

We were on a mission today to complete the middle 30k of the Chukanut 50K race. I quickly took a photo and caught back up with the group on the $2 trail. Once completed we headed up Cleator road, this 3 mile section of the race is about 8-10 percent grade., but all in all not too bad unless covered in 4-7 inches of powdery white stuff. This section took a lot longer than normal, the whole run toook longer than normal.

Once at the top, we run along the ridge trail and it is a ridge, views to both sides. Beautiful today. I was suprised that it wasn't worse, I had read about all the downed trees and branches and there were some, but not as many as I was expecting (based on articles I'd read). Stopped midway to take this picture of Mt Baker.

From Chukanut 50K ...

John and Paul had run a half marathon on Saturday so were falling a bit back. We decided to head on and hope they would skip the chinscraper section and we might all get back to the car about the same time. The Lost Lake section was a total difference from a week ago, no huge puddles, no huge mud pits, just lots of snow and some hard frozen ground. On the section Christy took a fall and hurt her leg and toes, but after a short walk she was running again.

The four of us in front made it to the bottom of Chinscraper and after a couple minutes started up. About a quarter mile into it, Christy's injury was making itself felt, it was a lot more painful for her to run up than down, so she turned around and took the shortcut to the fragrance lake road to get down.. John, Mike and I kept going up to the top of Chinscraper. We enjoyed the view for a minute or so and headed down Cleator Road to a short connector over to Fragrance Lake road back down to the car.

As it turns out, John and Paul skipped Chinscraper and only had about 10-15 minute wait for us, they had 4:20 run time, Christy got down and ran some of the flat Interurban and got back to the car just ahead of us. I had 4:11 run time and 18.86 miles. almost 4000 feet of climbing there somewhere. It was about 32 degress at our finish.

Another epic run after last weeks epic mud fest. GREAT!

All my images can be found here http://picasaweb.google.com/ggtriguy/Chukanut50KTrainingRun

WET WET WET

2007-01-08T15:53:00.000-08:00

Wow did I get wet this weekend. It's been windy and rainy for the past week or more and figured we'd get wet on our Sunday run.

On the way out at after 5 minutes of running was a very large puddle which I climbed through the bushes and over a rock to avoid, I shouldn't of bothered.

We did the Samish loop backwards and to add some time and (not) fun we added the "So Easy" trail. The "So Easy" trail is not so easy, its a hike (no running here) up a stream, normally this is not too bad and you can avoid the water, but not today. At the top it flattens out a bit through a quarter mile mud hole. By this time we are just so wet that you don't even bother trying to run around the edges, just right through and hope your shoes are tight enough to not disappear in the mud.

Coming down the Lost Lake trail (we run up it in the 50k) was like running down a river, this section is muddy in the middle of the summer and was a constant stream today. The spots that are muddy in the summer were small pools, and again no need to skirt around the edges.

Once out of the swampy area I thought it'd be nice and easy to get back to the car, but coming down the section through Arroyo park, I hit a nice patch of mud and slipped and fell, nice soft landing, but stretched out my quad unexpectedly. Walked a bit and then ran most the way back to the cars. No lingering quad pain later in day and next day leads me to think I'm fine.

Sometimes we stand around and talk a bit after the runs, but today everyone was cold and soaked to the bones, so we got in cars and headed home pretty quickly.

Looking forward to running more of the course and we are running the middle 30k (first and last 10 k are flat out and back). I've heard the ridge trail has lots of downed trees, but have not been up there in a while...

Things are picking up for my IRONMAN training as well, I got in the pool three times last week, but the third was cut short at about 15 minutes because the power went out at the pool. Getting dressed in the locker room was not too bad until the emergency lighting went out too.

I only got on the bike once last week, but it was outdoors. I need to ride more.

IMCDA training has begun!

2007-01-03T15:13:00.000-08:00

Just a quick message. I'm using a modified training plan from "Training Plans for Multisport Athletes" by Gale Bernhardt.

When I planned this out, it had me starting on Dec 25 which is 26 weeks before the IRONMAN on June 24. I did some training between Christmas and the New Year but not 100% to the plan, so I officially started on Tuesday January 2.

Not too much to report as yet.

I did have a great run on the morning of the 31st with a smaller group, we did the 'Samish' loop. Lots of climbing over the 3 hour run. We saw a Bald Eagle on a dead tree branch hanging out over Lost Lake, it took flight right after I turned on my camera (which makes a sound when I turn it on). I have since reset the settings to NOT make a sound when I turn it on.

Holiday Gatherings

2006-12-17T19:55:00.000-08:00

I ran with John and Christy on Saturday morning because we went to Seattle today for the first of five different Christmas celebrations.

We met at 7 am and on the drive over I realized we would be running in the dark and that I had forgotten my head lamp. Luckily Christy let me use hers. I was happy in the dark to be running on the flat Interurban trail. We went all the way out to Clayton beach parking lot, about 7:45 or so I was able to turn off the head lamp as it was finally not needed anymore.

We took a short break and then ran up the Fragrance Lake trail around the lake and down the 2$ trail. About half way down, we came to a sign and the trail was rerouted around some private land. This new section adds some elevation gain and distance to the Cleator road finish.

It seemed like we could run about 30 feet and then have to stop and walk and climb over and through all the downed tree branches, but we made it through. Once on Cleator road we ran down (the 50k we run up) to the Interurban trail and back to Fairhaven Park.

I woke up Sunday and went for a quick bike ride in the garage before we loaded up and drove to Seattle for our annual Christmas gathering to celebrate the birth of Christ with part of my family. My mom made an excellent spiral cut ham with all the fixins. We exchanged gifts followed with dessert made by my sister Danielle.

Chuckanut 50K training has begun

2006-12-10T15:36:00.000-08:00

We had our first 50K training run today. A little rain during my drive over and waiting in the car, but once we started running, we had no rain. What a great run, we ran on Galbraith also known as Lookout Mountain.

We started with about 11 or 12 runners and started climbing. Not much warmup from Whatcom Falls Park, you start climbing almost right away, but once your up, there are lots of ups and downs.

Our goal was 2 hours 30 minutes of running. The 'wonderland' loop we have done a few times is about 2 hours, so we added a couple other trails on the way up (2 1/2 Trail)and the way down (Intestine). These are great winding trails on some soft mud and pine needles.

Lots of downed trees and some snow drifts still hanging around. The snow was ok in places and a couple I sank into my knees. The worst part about the snow was the hidden puddles underneath. We made our way up to the top of wonderland near the cell towers and enjoyed the 270 degree view from most of Lake Whatcom and even a peak of the Twin Sisters around the north to into Canada. We could see Bellingham, Sandy Point, Ferndale and the refineries, not to mention pretty much all of the San Juan Islands. Words cannot describe, so I hope to bring a camera up there soon.

We went out to the south on a trail we have never run before called Evolution. WOW! The mountain bikers have been up there A LOT! There must of been a full quarter mile (in separate sections) of elevated skinnys, jumps and ramps. All these apparatuses have alternate ways around for bikers not up to the challenge and made for a nice soft descent.

What a great run.
12.3 Miles
2:25:15
130 Avg HR
1600 feet climbing

(Click any of my images for a more detailed view)

Oh Yeah! I ran the 19th Annual Bellingham Jingle Bell Run for Arthritis. They did not keep times this year, but I had a great race. I was just off my pace from last year, but VERY happy with my 6:45 mile pace. The 4 mile race took 26:43.

We went on a hunt after and found a great Christmas Tree. A Fraser Fir from Small's Farm on Northwest street, We've purchased from them before and they have a great farm and are some of the nicest people you could hope to meet. Came hope and put up some lights on the house, then tree. Debbie and the kids added the ornaments. I think it looks great!

Holidays are here

2006-12-03T18:33:00.000-08:00

Well the snow has started to melt and most roads are fine, I wasn't going to let that stop my bike ride... So I road in the garage. I finally tried out my latest Spinervals DVD 17.0 Areo Base Builder II.

I liked this DVD a little better than the 16.0 version. Both are good, slightly different format. In 17.0, you do a lot of short repeats, 16.0 the repeats are a bit longer.

After my bike ride in the garage, we went to the Bellingham Port Festival to checkout the Gingerbread houses. The port gets gingerbread houses from all over the community. Jacob made a nice Pirate ship and Alex made a Train. Each won an award in their age group!

We came home, got ready and drove to Seattle to my company holiday party. We dropped the kids off at my parents. They had pizza and movies while Debbie and I went to the party. It was very nice, at the Seattle Waterfront Marriott hotel. Three different Salmons and Prime Rib. They gave us each $10,000 funny money and had about 15 casino tables. I played Texas Hold-em for a little while, then went and played some Blackjack and a little Roulette. We ended up with $10,000 after all that. We turned in our chips for raffle tickets. Didn't win anything, but we had fun.

We all spent the night at my parents in Seattle. I woke up and went for a long run. Ran west on the Burke Gilman Trail (I usually head east) toward Puget Sound. Made it past Fremont into Ballard and went right past the Ballard Locks and around all the way to Golden Garden Park. Beautiful view of the Olympic mountains. I ran up the stairs, I didn't count, but there were a lot of them. Continued to wind my way through town and stopped at Green Lake for a drink of water and on my way home shortly after. Very nice run, about 12 miles total 1:47:17.

Got back to my parents and ate and showered and the whole family went to see the Pacific Northwest Ballet Nutcracker. Jacob did great in the theater, but it was a bit much for Alex to sit and watch for the 2+ hour show. We got there early and had lunch in the Center House and saw all the holiday decorations, after we walked through the center again and stopped to let the kids ride the holiday carousel.

Long drive back home and am ready for bed.

SNOW!

2006-11-26T16:03:00.000-08:00

We got lots of snow this weekend, but that was not going to affect my exercise, or was it.

I woke up Saturday morning to an inch or two of snow and drove out to Lake Padden for the second Cyclocrazed Cyclecross race. As usual I was one of the first to arrive. Got ready and eventually went down and registered. They were busily setting up the course. I waited in the car to stay warm, once enough of the course was set I went out in the snow to see how my bike would handle, or how I would handle the bike in the snow. It was not too bad. I made it around the course a few times and on my third lap I noticed that the bike was a little sluggish, slowed down and saw that I had a flat. I was hoping that it was a very slow leak and I just noticed it. I borrowed a pump and heard the bad news before I saw the tiny bubbles percolating out from the in between the rim and tire. I was toast as I unloaded everything from my bike at home and did not bring it. UG. Jacob showed up just as I was noticing the problem. We let him ride the course. He made one lap and that was enough for him. We decided to head home.

On Sunday, I woke up to green grass (no snow) and left to meet the group of trail runners at 8 am as usual. We ran from the VET in fairhaven. On my way there I went through a section of town that had about two inches of snow and is lower than our house (at the lake elevation: 340 feet).

The trail starts out flat and was very wet, not much snow, but starting to snow. We ran out the Interurban trail. After the first flat mile or so we turn and go up towards Lost Lake, turned onto a trail called Hush Hush (yeah don't tell anyone - its a great trail). As we ran up and up this very windy trail with lots of switchbacks where you can high five your friends as you run past I was noticing sections where it was in between trees that I was seeing 4-5 inches of snow.

At the end of Hush Hush we turned left and went towards the Hemlock trail and some went back and a few of us kept going up towards Raptor Ridge. The snow was getting deeper and deeper. It was GREAT! Running single file through the snow and we cut a nice path. We saw a lot of other runners out there today. We made it to the turn to Raptor Ridge and went up only to be turned back less than a quarter mile into this section of trail due to too many fallen trees blocking the way and with the heavy snow, no promise of beautiful view at the end. We turned back and ran down the same cut pathway we made coming up. I think the snow got as deep as about 7-8 inches on the run.

Going down in the snow was fun and slippery, but with a little care you can kindof run fast and slip and slide just a bit. Again we had lots of fallen trees to deal with, but not too bad.

We got back to the car to find about two inches had fallen while we were running. After driving home and parking out of our driveway, I mean the sled zone, we had lots of fun playing in the snow at home. I left with green grass to come home to about 3-4 inches. As I write this later in the day, we just got back in from Jacob testing out his new snowboard on our driveway and I measured about 10 inches in the backyard. Should last a couple days.

Sunday Run:
1:54:19
10.1 miles
138 Avg HR
1900 Ft Climbing

Turkey Trot

2006-11-19T11:12:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, the whole family did the Greater Bellingham Running Club (GBRC) Turkey Trot again this year. This local event is down at the Haggens near our house and very easy and is a FUNdraiser for the food bank. We arrived and registered and walked over to the starting area. We saw lots of friends milling around. We visited and did a little warmup around one of the buildings.

Debbie has run this event for three years in a row, and the second year in a row for the whole family. Alex is still in the stroller for this distance, but Jacob has run the 3.1 miles each year. Debbie ran ahead this year and I ran with Alex in the stroller keeping Jacob company. He sure did great, ran most the way, walked some.

We ran without any rain and very little wind which was a change from the toterential rain and wind this week. We only lost power for a little bit, but some in the county were out of power for a couple days.

We enjoyed the rest of the calm day by cleaning up the leaves and getting one last mowing of the lawn in.

Rain, Rain and more Rain

2006-11-13T08:22:00.000-08:00

I got wet this weekend, very wet.

On Saturday I went for a bike ride with two friends of mine, Mike and John. Only real heavy rain was going to stop our ride. I rode over to John's place to meet them, I was already very wet before we started our ride. We went south out and around Lake Samish. My neoprene booties kept me warm enough, but they soaked up so much water that it affected my pedal stroke. I felt real sluggish. Both John and Mike are great cyclists (They took two of the top three spots at the Hill Climb this year) and I fell back on each climb (even the small short ones). They'd wait for me at key locations, so I probably got a better workout since I didn't have to stop and get cold every so often ;-). As it turned out, we had maybe 10 minutes of our 30 mile ride with no rain, but we knew it was going to start back up because Mike kept saying how nice it had gotten.

On Sunday, I met the trail running group at the vet in the rain, The run is on trails through the woods, but it had been raining so much lately that the rain was coming through even the dense evergreens. I started back in the gym this week and even getting out of bed was feeling quite sore in muscles I hadn't felt in quite a while. This combined with my bike ride on Saturday made for a tough run. I started out fine (its a flat first mile) but when we started climbing I was really feeling tired. We went up and ran the "hush hush" trail. This is a great trail that winds back and forth through the woods, not very much under brush, and the trail is very soft and full of leaves and pine needles. It winds so much that there are switchbacks where you could take one step over a log and skip a large section of the trail. This also makes it a great trail to run with a group, because even as we spread out you get to see all your friends.

I made it to the top of the hush-hush trail and was feeling very tired so decided to turn back with Carol who has been working through an injury was cutting her run shorter too. The rest of the group was going to continue up to Lost Lake. I finished with the 7 mile run soaking wet.

CYCLOCRAZED!

2006-11-05T17:53:00.000-08:00

Today marked my first cyclecross event. Going to bed the night before to an thunder and lighting show made me wonder if I was going to go or not. Sunday morning came and there was a full moon as I walked to get the newspaper. I was not so concerned about the full moon, but happy that I could see through the clouds. I didn't have any rain for my race or for Jacobs after.

Jacob and I had been to two cyclecross practices and were looking forward to actually racing. I went up to WWU campus about 8 and Debbie, Jacob and Alex came up a bit later. There was a delay in the start to the Mens C race which was my classification (by choice) so they were able to get some good pictures.

There were 10 in the Mens C classification, We rolled out at about 9:30, the Mens C Masters went about 1 minute behind and the women's C went about 1 minute after that.

The course was on and around the south part of WWU campus, We started in one of the gravel parking lots, riding north around through a tunnel, first a little run up (some rode, but I chose to run it each time after crashing during the morning warmups). Up and around one of the famous campus sculptures and around and over a single barrier and through the "castle" structure, around the trees and across the road down a short single track section back onto the gravel. That is the north loop. The south loop was longer and tougher.

After crossing the road we weaved through and around some trees on the slanted grassy slopes towards the new tennis courts, down and up and then a short run up right near the visitor center. Again I chose to run this each time after crashing during warmups, these little run ups gave me problems, I got knobby tires, but kept slipping out and then over as I couldn't keep balance and nor get out of my clips. Its all fun though as you fall over onto the soft wet grass.

After this we go up a path and gravel road to the real run up for the course, this is where I finally made my first pass. At the top we turned left and met the barriers to run over. Looped around and cross the 'finish' line... 5 more laps to go...

To get back to where we started, We looped around the gravel parking lot back to the sloped grass and trees just north of the new tennis courts. The toughest part here was the loose pine needles and sloped hill covering all the exposed roots. Getting past that we had a pretty steep down hill section only to have to run back up (most biked back up, but again I just ran). More weaving through the trees we finally crossed the road back to where we started to go do that north loop again. What FUN!

I'm looking forward to doing this again, The Cyclcocrazed people will be doing another event on November 25 up at Lake Padden, Check it out at http://www.cyclocrazed.com

Jacob had fun doing his race too. He went with about 7 other kids of various ages, He 3 loops of the very same north loop, doing all the same run ups and barriers, going through the castle and down the single track.

Sunrise Bike Ride

2006-11-04T19:49:00.000-08:00

Some friends and I road up to Sunrise this summer. It was a beautiful day.

Don, Pat and I met at 6am at Federation Forest State Park. After figuring out parking we got on the road about 6:15 or so. The road is State Highway 410 and at that time in morning there was not much traffic, but even so we had a very nice wide shoulder.

We made a stop at a rest area with a nice view of Mt Rainier, it was the first view of the mountain on the ride.

After a bit more riding we made it to the entrance to Mt Rainier National Park just past the turn to Crystal Mountain ski area. Before we knew it we were at the fee station collecting fees for entrance to the National Park. $5 each and quick rest and then we set off for the real climb. Actually just after the ranger station the road goes downhill for about a mile.

Still no view of the mountain. We climbed and climbed, not too much traffic, not much shoulder, but riding with friends help visibility with drivers. We kept climbing, eventually we came to the turn of the final switchback and this turn is on its own peak with beautiful views all around. As we make the turn we got an excellent view of the mountain.

After this switchback, it is about 1 more mile and not much more climbing. We rolled into the parking lot at about 9:55, parked the bikes and saw that the grill opened at 10:00 am, so we each got a burger and some rest for the fast decent.

What a great ride!

Long trail run

2006-10-30T09:04:00.000-08:00

Ran with a group of trail runners I've been running with since last year on Sunday morning before we went to Seattle to visit family.

Was a great run, I decided to wear shorts even though the temperatures have been dropping, started out a little cold, but after a bit I warmed up and was a beautiful run. Perfect weather, had some strong winds up on top.

We ran "up" the Wonderland trail to the towers on top of Galbraith (lookout mountain). We have run down this trail, but this was my first time "up" the trail. The Wonderland trail is a very nice trail that goes back and forth all over a recent clear cut.

My GPS measured 11.84 miles in about 2:01

Welcome to my IRONMAN CDA 2007 Blog

2006-10-27T09:07:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my blog.

I will try and blog information about my training, how I feel and general stuff on my journey to train and complete the IRONMAN event in Coeur d'Alene Idaho June 24, 2007