boulder beer mile

we learned a few things today at the boulder beer mile.

1) don't ever trust a man dressed in a smokers jacket...for they can both run & drink
2) blake ottersberg could not only pass as a Mexican but also hugh hefner w/ a fro



3) i didn't realize boulder triathletes were such wusses and would watch but not compete in a race as great and important as the boulder beer mile





4) pete valenytik is a stud -- the defending BBM champ had a flu bug and finished 2nd today
5) practice makes nearly perfect as Barry Siff (5430 sports race director) showed today with his 7th place BBM performance
6) world champions & olympians will watch and wish they too might one day have the tenacity to complete a BBM (Matty Reed, Simon Lessing & Joanna Zieger in attendance)*

Here are a few pics from today....



*Zeiger was 1 of 3 female competitors in the BBM today and defended her crown as female champ, doubling in the impressive double double award of 70.3 Ironman champ and BBM champ.



My sister-in-law, Kendra Deppe, finished second in her first race at altitude.

pathetic -- beermile practice attempt

I know this sounds pathetic, and on the edge of extreme tri-dorkiness, but tonight I completed a test "workout" for the upcoming Boulder Beer-mile.

Em was a champ and acted as the official heckler, I mean timer, and Thor & Izzy dutifully served as pacing rabbits. However, this horse took nearly one minute to chug the first 17oz Bitburger beer, a little less than two minutes to run each 1/4-mile, and just over a minute to drink the second 17 oz Bitburger.



It had been nearly five years since I've attempted chugging a beer and it was a sobering display that leaves me in a fragile mental state going into next Wednesdays Beer-mile race. The only consolation was knowing in the actual race we will only have to down 12 oz cans each lap and not 17 oz ones (I drank the equivalent of three beers).



Hope you enjoyed the photos...

x-mas gallery

anticipation



flatirons, boulder, colorado



talk softly, carry a big stick



izzy with her mommy



thor & izzy with their daddy



have a merry christmas, from the finangers

we got the jet lag blues

While Emmy is busy casting her vote for the "hottest male athletes of 2008" on Roman Mica's Everyman Tri blog, I thought I would jot a few notes from this past week.



We've been plagued by jet lag since flying home from Asia last week. We've both done a lot of traveling but we've never been hit this hard. We even had trouble staying awake through the entire episode of The Office last night! 2:30, 3:00, 4:00 and this morning 4:15 were our wake up calls this past week. Things are looking up though as we went to Slumdog Millionaire (Mee-lan-air) tonight and are still up as the clock strikes 11pm! Let's hope that means we can sleep in tomorrow.

I hope you enjoy the videos recently added to the side bar of this blog site featuring American cyclist David Zabriskie's new company, DZ Nuts. These commercials are hilarious but the product is, um, a lifesaver out on bike rides.

On a slightly less hilarious note, Normann Stadler flew in from Germany this last week to get a bike fit at our Retul headquarters. He also demo'd our new outdoor motion capture tracking tool called Retul Red. I put together a short video with highlights (and lots of blinking red lights). If you're a cyclist, you might enjoy.

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxPOxqGiRpU

Forecast in the mountains tomorrow is snow, so Emmy and I are planning a drive up the canyon to Eldora for a snowshoe. Will see about getting some pictures.

Home

We got home from Thailand last night after 26 hours of straight traveling. We actually left Thailand on Friday and spent the night in Singapore and had a walking tour of the city and started the long trip home on Saturday morning. It was good to see Thor and Izzy again and they seemed pretty happy to see us. We are so lucky that we had our friends Rob for the first week and Carole for the second week to watch the dogs. Thor won't leave Lars' side since we have been home for fear that he will leave again.

We actually took pictures this trip which is out of the norm for us. My parents have a digital camera that can be used under water so we got some pretty cool pictures from our snorkeling trip in the Phi Phi Islands.

On our last morning in Phuket I saw the two baby elephants visiting with the kiddos at the Sheraton resort. There was one elephant who was 1 year old, named Lucky, who played the harmonica and danced along as he was playing. It was pretty cute. No pictures of that but lots of other pictures. Some of Phuket and some from the Phi Phi Islands. Here are the pictures:

Thailand

News from Phuket

We have been in Phuket for a few days and today we are stuck inside due to some rain. The big news of the day is that today we won the Fun Run associated with the Phuket Triathlon. We tried to enter the triathlon last minute because there were several cancellations and there would have been a chance to win some money if we could have found bikes. Unfortunately, there weren't any bikes available so we had to resign ourselves to do the 6k Fun Run. When signing up there was an option to enter into the 'pro' division of the Fun Run. It is a bit of an oddity to have a pro division in a race called a fun run but that is how Lars thought we should sign up. I think it was my first running race that I have won since the 5th grade Turkey Trot when I was the only girl racing. It was nice to be in the low stress race and I think we would both benefit from doing more hard run efforts like that throughout the winter. Lars' Mom and Dad also ran in the Fun Run and my parents were in charge of taking photos and cheering.

We are getting nice and tan and having a very relaxing vacation. We got some elephant kisses after the run from one of the baby elephants they have walking around the resorts.

for all you couples out there...

Especially to our friends, the Marshes. We're expecting a bit of a wardrobe change from the two of you....

Check out this dedicated couple...http://www.modbee.com/local/story/517554.html

IM Arizona

I'll attempt to make my race report from IM Arizona a short and entertaining one!

Racing in Grandpa's backyard in Tempe, AZ was good fun as I had the ex-collegiate cross country coach yelling for me all day. It meant so much to have Emmy at the bike turnaround and under the bridge on each lap of the run for motivation! I know she hates being a spectator but it helped speed up my day out there.

I was racing with a new set of equipment (high tech goodies) including Zipp 808's, a Powertap, and a disc wheel cover from Wheelbuilder.com. They worked their magic and performed but my legs didn't have their usual pep out there on the bike course. But, I'm jumping ahead of myself.

Despite getting a full night sleep (8pm - 3am), I was still scrambling to get into Tempe Town Lake as the last of the 100+ total pros to get in prior to race start. After a quick warm up, I got a speedy start and found some open water with an inside line. The fastest swimmers started closer to shore and took a tangent and were gone, but I tucked in behind a few specialty colored-caps (all pro men wore yellow, but athlete's who they want to spot wear different colors). I was in a small group with four different cap swimmers so I knew I was in good shape. And, the swimmer I was directly behind was a big dude (Chris McDonald, 185lbs) and was providing a great draft.

I was locked into a safe position in this group until Chris got annoyed with me tapping on his toes and gave me a swift kick smack into the middle of my face. It busted my goggles which I promptly threw off. I learned very quickly Tempe Town Lake is the same consistency as mud and visibility was zero feet. I lost the group and the next group looked to be 30 seconds to 1+ minutes back, so I settled down and just kept on with the best pace I could. I lost over one-minute in the final half-mile to the group that ended up including Paul Amey, Jordan Rapp, Scott Curry, Chris Martin and McDonald. Still, the clock read 51:50 at the swim exit which meant the cool water led to some quick times (and the course may have been a bit short).

Out on the bike I was quickly joined by Ben Hoffman and the defending men's champ, Jozef Major. I rode behind them as Ben was pushing a strong pace and I figured he would pull us up to the main chase pack of pro men. For better or worse, I began listening to my Powertap which said we were pushing 340+ watts and since it was Ben's first Ironman I thought he would be cracking with that pace. I chose to back off so I would not pay the price later on. My goal going into the race was to finish with a solid marathon and I was prepared to let my bike split suffer as a result. While the bike is my stongest suit, I knew I needed to back off to have the chance at a solid run. (Ed note: to Ben's credit, he biked a 4hr 30min bike and ran an impressive 2:56:00 to finish 6th in his Ironman debut....he was just very strong!).



Anyways, since it's my blog, I'll go back to talking about me and my race (isn't that what triathletes do best!).

On lap two of the three lap bike, I sat on my 270-280 pre-ordained wattage limit and could tell I was losing a bit of time to the group who looked to be legally riding in their pack. The third lap, my watts fell off a bit and I rode between 240-250 which meant my pace slowed. I was okay with this since I knew I was just trying to get into transition, take in nutrition, and mentally prepare for the run.

In all my run training going up to the race, I wore a waist belt with a water bottle. My strategy was to avoid having to stop at aid stations which in the past provided me an excuse to walk and rest up a bit. This strategy paid off and despite a few porta-potty stops, I ran the whole blasted course! It wasn't fast, but I kept moving one foot in front of the next. That was a huge mental hurdle to get past! I wasn't too concerned with my overall placing or finishing time as those weren't my goals but did run the final two miles faster than all the rest. It was a relief to see the finish chute and realize I could now enjoy a nice, long off-season. My first tri race was in March so that makes nearly 10 months of racing. It's time to put the bike, goggles and shoes on the shelf and dust off the nordic skiis for a bit of a break. I can't wait.

Swim (2.4mi): 51:51 (25th)
Bike (112mi): 4:45:27 (22nd)
Run (26.2mi): 3:29:47 (25th)
Finish: 9:12:03 (29th overall)

Thanks to all my family and supporters out there in Tempe yesterday and to all others for you help throughout the season. I hope I have thanked most of you at some point individually throughout the year, but if not, thank you.



Cheers,
Lars

yesterday

swim: 4,100-m, complete, very smooth, finished workout with a controlled set of 100's. Opted to swim workout with wetsuit for race day simulation.

bike: 6 x 10 minutes at race day pacing with 3 minutes easy in between intervals, very smooth on flat and rolling terrain out towards carter lake and rabbit mountain. 2.5 hours total. got some funny looks riding around in my spiuk aero helmet...can't say i blame them. i'm only a tri dork for one more week though!

run: 6 miles after bike, 30 seconds/mile faster than race day pace, very smooth.

------------------------------

today is off besides sunday swim workout at flatirons w/ jane's squad.

off to the pool

today is high on quality and no BS, 8 days out from IM AZ race day:

Swim: 4,100m: 200 warm up, 800 pull, 3x800 with 15 sec rest, 5x100 @ 1:30, 200 cool down

Bike: Carter Lake route with 4x10 min at race pace w 5 mins recover

Run: 5 miles off the bike

will follow up tonight with how the day went

(Ed note: that's Thorskie looking pissed that I'm walking out the door without him)

goodies for race day

Arizona travel day is one week away and taper time is now upon the Finanger household. This is the time when the volume of workouts starts to drastically decrease and your appetite remains on high alert. Tapering is like an annual, or semi-annual, ritual for endurance athletes and thank god for that. Because tapering sucks. I have never felt good during a taper, am constantly restless, and want to devour everything in sight. The only problem is, I'm not training with the same volume as usual throughout the season so I'm not burning the same amount of calories. This means unless one remains diligent about their nutritional intake, they can put on some extra pounds during this time.

The other problem is experimenting with your body to get the timing of a taper down right. Tapering for a 50 or 100 meter swim race is vastly different than tapering for an Olympic Distance triathlon which is vastly different than tapering for an Ironman. I've tried three week, two week, and ten day tapers in the past and the magic number for Arizona this year will be nine days. Honestly, there is not much rhyme or reason for why I decided on this, merely that I've wanted to keep my running miles higher than usual so I can tackle my main goal next weekend which is to finish my day with a 3:20 marathon or better. Might sound easy to most, but the best I've gone so far has been 3:30 at Kona in 2006.

I've incorporated a few cheating devises to help reign in my usual plan of a blitzkrieg bike split in order to help save my legs for the final leg -- a Cyclops PowerTap. I opted to build this nifty power measuring devise into a Zipp 808 rear wheel....but behold, another secret weapon, a disc wheel cover from the famous cycling engineer, Richard Sawaris of Wheelbuilder.com, will fit over the 808 rim and power meter to employ the advantages of a disc wheel on the possibly windy AZ course. My final secret weapon is the skull & crossbones of the Avia tri kit that good friend Julie V sent my way for race day. I opted to wear a time-trial skin suit during the cycling portion of IM Canada in August but paid for this decision by retaining a lot of heat on a warm day. The only way I'd go that route again is if Torbjorn Sindballe let me borrow his all-white Craft kit but that would be kind of gross.

Enough rambling...see, another side effect from tapering....the mind just races and has nothing better to do but think stupid thoughts.

Best of luck to everyone else training out there (yup, talking to you MarkyV) and suffering through a taper too.

LF

How much are you getting out of your body?

45 miles per gallon

Created by The Car Connection

golf w grandpa

12 more days until my last race of the 08 season. I'm quite motivated for a good result as I've had some of my most consistent run training of the last few years. At this point all the long, hard miles are done and in the bank and now it's time to recover, freshen up, and get to the starting line healthy.


I know the Arizona course quite well as my Grandpa Kent has lived in the western Phoenix suburb of Goodyear and I've gone out for training camps the last four years. Two times we've gone out during IM week and in 2006 I raced the swim and bike portion but pulled out while leading all amateurs at mile 9 of the run due to a foot injury.

Emily told me while she was cheering on the sidewalk with Grandpa, he kept saying "Go Lars, Go Lars" to every single person cycling past. Because it is a three-lap bike course, there are lots of chances to get motivated by the crowd. Emily kept a rough time split going so she could tell Grandpa when I actually came riding by. It is great to have family at the race and this year Emily will be towing Grandpa & Grandma around for some more action (I know she is bursting with anticipation). Luckily she will have Amy Marsh (she is injured but her husband Brandon is racing) at the race so they can place bets on the battle between husbands!



After the race is over, I'll be ready for a juicy burger, french fries, and maybe I can track down a Das Boot (the enormous German beer stein in the shape of a boot) to have with dinner. But, of course, the main reason I love going to Arizona is so I can go golfing with Grandpa on Monday afternoon! The former collegiate cross country coach and all around stud athlete back in his day is 76 years young with two knee and two hip replacements, but can't go a day without his two mile bike ride, two cups of coffee, two remote controllers to watch college basketball games on two different tv's and his weekly golf game. He continues to be one of my greatest inspirations.

Cheers,
Lars

fantasy football freakshow

...yup, that's me. rewind one year and i was the laughing stock of my college friends as i didn't once check or update my fantasy football team. i finished last and only won one game. i was ridiculed by many and considered a "bye-week" by all within the league. two weeks before the this year's draft selection, our league commissioner and my old roomate, Jimbo, emailed and said the league members had voted me out of the league since i didn't even participate. i promised him if he allowed me to stay, i would turn the page and dedicate the appropriate attention to the season.

i may still be ranked 7th out of the 11 teams but no one in the league can accuse me of not trying. i am tops in the league in total number of transactions - which basically means i follow the stats way too often and try and find the best players not originally selected in the draft.

i have also given the game way too high of a priority during my weekend schedule. sunday's are spent cranking out my ride/run brick workouts then zooming back to the house to catch all the updates on how my players performed. i find myself yelling at players i never previously knew existed and have become the #1 fan or #1 worst enemy of players. in other words, i've been getting much more recovery time and spending way too much time in front of the tv on sundays.

luckily there are only six weeks left in the season so i can soon take my life back and spend some more time outdoors! until then, my best friends from college have six weeks left as my worst enemies!

LOL fellow Lincoln Manorites,
LF

He-Man and She-Ra

It's been awhile since the last post and I have some incriminating evidence to present to you - the Finangers blog reader. This was snapped last Friday night on Halloween for a party at one of Emmy's co-worker's house. I will leave her name anonymous but will divulge that she and her boyfriend ordered Juno and Pauly Bleeker outfits for their costume while Emmy and I spent many a sleepless night slaving away to make our perfect costumes. I'll let you be the judge.....

CLANK CLANK -- the sound of a double brick

With just under one month before IM AZ (28 days), I had one of my more targeted training weekends this year. Since 2006, I tried putting the bulk of my IM preparation towards producing a killer bike split only to have my run implode. So once fully recovered from IM Canada, I opted to get my running legs back and put in the appropriate and adequate miles to go the distance in non-walking fashion.



Saturday was a spectacular day in the CO Foothills, warm and sunny, so Em & I rode together out to Carter Lake. We saw so many others out too; Jodee & Barry Siff, Amanda & Michael Lovato and we rolled up to Kau before the Carter Lake turn. Em turned towards Carter with Kau - who is also training for AZ - and I continued to roll out towards Big Thompson Canyon. I kept the pace mellow until the Dam Store then put in some longer efforts on the climbing portion up to Glenhaven. It was the first time in over a year riding this solo as Griffo, Savloy, Joe and Chuggy were my crime partners this past summer.



I kept a nice aerobic pace on the way back down Hwy 34 until the turn back towards Carter Lake at which time I picked up the pace again. I pushed until the Hygiene Store before stopping for a quick Gatorade then back on the Elite Joule (named Sherpa - after the famous Nepalese Mountain Men and also my favorite restaurant in Boulder) and another sustained effort back into town. Altogether it was just under 100 miles with the best still to come.

Off went the cycling shoes and kit, on went the running shoes and Camelbak fanny pack, and off I went for a 10k transition run to Flatirons to meet Em for a swim. The swim could better be described as a flounder and I thought it's a good thing they kick tris off with swims or there would be many more drownings (when i lived in Belgium, i raced a triathlon in Rutger Beke's hometown of Leuven that consisted of multiple short-short races that mixed up the discipline order and finished with a swim in the canal -- it was brutal).

Sunday was another big test and a new workout for me compliments of Em. She asked me why I always opted to complete my long run in one fell swoop and why I didn't ever try breaking it up into two separate smaller runs. So, yesterday I set the Isaac Joule Aerotic TT bike on the Computrainer and rode 2.5 hours, followed by a 1.5 hour run, followed by a 1 hr bike, and topped off with a 35 minute run. The hardest leg of all was that second bike which I thought was a realistic "feeling" of miles 80-100 of an Ironman bike ride where cramped calves are always an erred pedal stroke away.

This workout was mentally refreshing breaking the mold of my usual Magnolia long runs and if I can get myself out the door before the NFL games start next Sunday, I might just have to do this double brick up on the Peak-to-Peak and Mags.



In other news, check out my recent interviews with US Navy SEAL David Goggins and the soon-to-be-posted Wolfgang Dittrich and Joe Gambles on Slowtwitch.com.

Running to higher ground

I told Em last night (twice according to her) that "if I'm not careful I'm going to start feeling like a runner". The reason for the increase in run mileage these last two months is so I can tackle my primary goal at IM AZ, to run the marathon.

So, I'm taking on the advice passed down to me from one of triathlon's sages -- Timothy Carlson -- who has tried telling me for the past four years that I don't include enough run mileage in my weekly workouts for successful Ironman racing.

I've been including two to three 1-hr runs, one 1.5-hr run, and one 2+ hr run each week and adding in one or two short brick runs off the bike.



Today's run was up at altitude on the Switzerland Trail up on SugarLoaf Mtn. This run descends five miles to the tiny valley community of Sunset before climbing back up the rocky dirt trails to the Switzerland trailhead. It was beautiful running weather, ranging between 35-50 degrees, with the uphill portion taking 15-20 minutes longer than the descent, with snow scattered across the non-exposed sections of the trail.

Tomorrow is a series of cycling intervals on the Computrainer followed by a short brick run leading into a big weekend block of cycling and running.



Changing subjects entirely, last night was our 2nd anniversary. We were married on the Big Island in a small ceremony with some of our close friends and family. That entire week was a blast having 20-plus Finangers and Deppes running around wreaking havoc in Kona leading up to our wedding on one of the public beaches between Kailua-Kona and Waikoloa Village. Last night we celebrated with dinner at Radda's, a great little European restaurant in North Boulder.

early bird workout

got up early-style at 4am - i think because i was nervous of being late for my massage this morning - but got in my first indoor Computrainer workout of the year. using an indoor trainer is beneficial, especially one that holds power - like a Computrainer, so you can lock in your desired wattage and then just focus on pedaling. of course, i threw in the 2007 tour de france dvd so listening to phil liggett and paul sherwin spitting our their play-by-play dialogue made the workout shoot by quickly. the biggest drawback is going through multiple towels in an effort to keep my isaac joule aerotic tt bike from getting washed away in the flood of sweat.

a quick three mile transition run to keep that feeling of running off the bike, then a big breakfast and a few cups of 100% royal kona coffee before my first massage since before ironman canada in august. my legs received a beating from massage therapist Lisa Lessing, formerly Lisa Lahti - a top professional triathlete and dedicated mother of two girls and wife to the greatest triathlete of all-time, Simon Lessing.

Mags

I really only have one goal in mind while training for IM AZ next month and it might sound easy enough, but I've yet to accomplish it. Run the entire marathon. So, my training this fall has been dedicated to putting in enough run miles to do so. Today, I was back to Magnolia Rd - a 15-mile out & back starting at 8,200-feet and rolling up & down out to the Peak to Peak Hwy at 8,750-feet. Then you get to turn around and go back. This ends a big week on the feet with runs on 6 of 7 days, including a 14-miler on Friday morning and two other one hour runs.

The run starts with a wicked 1k downhill which means you get to face that same hill at the end. Just before starting, I ran into Lance Panguitti - a local race director - and Aaron Hersch - a wrench at Colorado Multisport and a tech writer in triathlon. They were with two other guys and had just climbed the 4.5-miles of steep paved roads that lead up to the gravel where the run starts. Aaron was one summit into a long afternoon on his Serotta that was going to take him up Magnolia, Sugarloaf, Lee Hill, Sunshine and Flagstaff. I'm looking forward to seeing how that worked out for him...

Tomorrow I have my first massage since this past summer with Lisa Lessing. I'm scared shitless that she is going to rip my legs off as I know she and Simon steer a hard ship at their household and aren't easy on the faint-of-heart.

Stirring it up.....

Spiced the weekend workout up a bit today in preparation for Ironman Arizona on Nov. 23rd. I slept through my alarm and got a late start to the day (Em finished her ride about the time I got started). With race day getting closer, I've been focusing the last few weeks on going longer with my running. So, this past week, I decided it was time to get reacquainted with my bike again. I started out with a 30-minute ride from the house to the pool and jumped in for a 40-minute straight swim. This was followed up with a 3 hour ride up Flagstaff Mtn, and out to McCaslin Blvd. I topped the day off with a 50-minute run around Wonderland Lake and back on Hwy 36 for a 5-hour day.

It felt great to do a different kind of workout since it's late in the season and staying mentally fresh is almost as important as staying physically fresh. Tomorrow morning is back to the tried-and-true 15-mile run up at Mags.

Hawaii recap

IM Hawaii race day was one week ago and I wanted to share a few reflections from the trip out to the Big Island.

12) Not racing this year brought a new perspective. Making time to talk with racing and industry friends was a must and seeing everyone in their element.
11) Being annoyed with our three hour layover in Honolulu and taking the Wiki Wiki shuttle too many times between terminals.
10) Staying 25 miles out of Kailua at the Waikoloa Resort and spending some quality time with Cracknell and Bentley.
9) Swimming out on the course and staying very calm when I thought I encountered two tiger sharks (they were dolphins).
8) Interviewing Navy SEALs' David Goggins and Keith Davids before bike check-in (they were not impressed with my shark story)
7) Getting invited to accompany the SEAL team on the boat to pick up the SEAL parachute jumpers on race morning.
6) Yelling at all the drafters (especially the guys drafting off faster women!) out on the bike course near Waikoloa.
5) Walking the Queen K with Franko during the run course and hitch-hiking our way up and down the course.
4) Receiving word that Retul's very own Craig Alexander won the race in dominating fashion!
3) My beautiful wife kept me and Franko entertained all day with text messages of the race updates while we were out on the course receiving no information.
2) Having Norman run by at mile 24 and tell us "no more ha-vy-ee" and "i we-tire" and knowing that he is so full of it!
1) Flying back from Kona the night of the race and being back in Colorado Sunday.

All in all, it was great to experience Kona again, this time from a very different angle. It was much more relaxing even though us Retul guys did work our tails off throughout the three days! Stay tuned for my article on the Navy SEALs I will be posting for Slowtwitch.com next week.

Aloha,
LF

tough cookies and kona coffee

well, i won't try to hide my disappointment. a few nights ago i received confirmation i would be one of a few "journalists" provided access to join the US Navy SEALs on one of their practice parachute jumps leading up to Saturday's Ironman Hawaii. i was giddy all day long, counting down the hours until i could get a few hours of rest to wake up early and board the airplane with the guys who would be jumping.


so, tonight after an early dinner with Franko, and Bentley and Cracknell, i plopped down into bed earlier than usual. just as i was closing my eyes, i got a phone call...the jump was off. the reason i was given was that our background checks did not clear security in Washington. i still have my alarm set for 3:30am and i'll drive to the airport outside of town just to make sure they don't leave without me, however, i'm pretty bummed that it was cancelled. you can bet tomorrow i'll begin my lobbying to get on the plane to witness the jump happen on race day. we'll see!


otherwise, kona has been a blast. i wish Em was here...we were married on the island coming on two years ago. i'll make it a point to go on a run tomorrow out by the natural energy lab where Em & I placed our "mahalo rocks" on the side of the road, that signify our marriage blessing.



this morning, i woke up bright and early at 5:15am and ran on the Queen K Hwy from our condo out in Waikoloa Village. we are staying 25 miles outside of kona, which has actually been great as we've been staying away from the circus that kona turns into this Ironman week.

we did make it into town around 10:00am for a series of meetings for Retul and was excited to see a larger expo presence than in past years. this was largely due to the hard work of triathlete mag's Sean Watkins. Franko and i had a chance to speak with the top guns from all the major bike brands and ran into a few athletes too.

it was great to see Cliff English cruising around the expo and he spent alot of time shooting the shit with us about the launch of his new coaching business, his wife's - Samantha McGlone - unfortunate and untimely achilles injuries and other industry news.

as my schedule has suddenly opened up tomorrow morning, i'll drag Franko down to the Kailua Pier first thing in the AM so we can swim out to the Coffees of Hawaii yacht anchored 700-meters offshore. this has been a brilliant marketing strategy from COF owner, Albert Boyce, and they have not only attracted all the top stars but also a daily visit by the 30-plus spinner dolphins who have been frequenting the bay this week.



i'm fully prepared to be an outcast tomorrow as i'll be one of few hairy-legged dudes down at the Pier, but can't wait to jump in and taste the salt water again. if i don't write another blog, it's likely because i've been nabbed by one of the - likely hundreds - of tiger sharks swimming in the deeps off the bay. hey, it's worth the risk! at least i had a cuppa 100% Kona Coffee this AM!

One small victory...

This past Sunday Lars and I set out on a bike ride together. We were planning to ride out to Lyons and then head up St. Vrain Canyon to the Peak to Peak Highway over to Ward and then descend down Ward back home. We started out together and Lars warned me that at the beginning of the climbing in Lyons he would take off and we would meet up again at the top.


At the beginning of the 12-mile climb up to the Peak to Peak highway Lars and I were riding next to each other and he says "Ok, sweetie, I'm going to take off, I'll come back to meet you after I get to the top". Usually when this happens and Lars takes off, he really takes off and I have no chance to ever catch back up. It must have been my lucky day because Lars took off but he only got about 10 meters ahead and that is it. I decided I should try to catch back up for no good reason other than because I thought it would be funny. It was funny enough to me that I nearly killed myself to catch up to him just so I could say "You are going to have to go faster than that if you want to have the fastest bike split at IM." At that point Lars took off, this time for good, up the mountain.

The climb up St. Vrain was pretty difficult following my attack on my hubby but I still had a decent time to the top. The bad news is that on the next 10 mile climb over to Ward I nearly fell off my bike. I was going so slow on that section of road that Lars had time to do an extra few mile climb to Brainerd Lake and still got to Ward 10 minutes before me! I definitely paid for my little joke but I still think it was funny.


Monday was my birthday and Lars made sure I had a good one. We went for a swim at the North Boulder Rec Center and then went out to the Buff for breakfast. I had to work all day but then Lars took me out to dinner with some of our good friends at The Kitchen.

Lars just left for Kona today and I already miss him. He'll be there working for the next few days for both Retul and Slowtwitch. We have a contest of who will be more tan after his trip to Hawaii. It is a little of an unfair contest since it is supposed to snow here in Boulder this weekend. Luckily for me, Lars doesn't get all that tan so if I just swim outside a few times I could still win...

Emily

back from vegas

it was a long five days in vegas, away from my wonderful wife and two dogs.

i was in vegas for the annual bicycle trade show, Interbike, where manufacturers wheel out the latest and greatest products that will be coming to market during the upcoming year. these five days also represent a few other things; long days, long nights, little sleep, excellent dinners, smokey hotels, and my only chance to play the tables all year.

as luck (or stupidity) would have it, my cell phone ran out of batteries within the first hour after getting off the plane and i brought a wall charger that did not recognize my phone. that did not make Em very happy as communicado was on an all-time low during the week. luckily for her, i am not one to seek out sin, and only played a max of two hours at the craps table each night.

the show was great for our company, Retul 3D bike fitting, and we had a constant flow of traffic in and out of our booth all week. we also hosted the Schools of Bike Fit, which featured four of the most prominent fit experts in cycling, who spoke on pressing topics in the sub-economy of the bike fit world. we had a great turnout with 140 folks packing our tiny conference room to hear industry leaders like Dan "Slowman" Empfield speak.

now back in boulder, it is time to put in a few good weeks of training to get some fitness for November's IM AZ race. going to vegas always leaves me excited to get back into home and back into the daily routine of getting in consistent workouts again.

train well,
lars

Interbike

Lars left today for a week-long bike festival in Las Vegas called Interbike. I call it a bike festival but I guess the technical name is an industry trade show. It is going to be strange having Lars gone for a whole week- since starting his new job with Retul he hasn't had to travel as often so I have become accustomed to having him around. Because Lars is gone all week I moved all of the chick flicks to the top of our Netflix queue since he generally won't watch them with me.

The big deal is that now there are more females in the house than males. We bought our condo two years ago and since then I have always been the only woman living here. The only reprieve I have had is when we adopted Izzy, she balanced things out a little bit but we were still outnumbered. The only people we have had stay here have been guys. But, our friend Carole Sharpless has moved out to Boulder and is living at our place for a little while. So, since last week we females outnumber Thor and Lars 3-2 and now poor Thor is left here alone with all the girls! I think he can handle it, though.

On another note, we have booked tickets to our trip to Thailand in December! We will meet Lars' parents and my parents in Phuket, Thailand for a week.

Emily

Make it work

Yesterday was a mish-mash of various workouts including an early AM trail run with Thorskie - my ADD Chessy Bay Retriever, a 1.5 hour afternoon ride with big gear & slow cadence intervals topped off with a 1.5 hour water polo scrimmage. Last night, I managed to drag good friend Kevin Burnette down to Denver with me. He pulled out his connections and called up another former triathlete, Kiley, who had a 43-minute shorter commute than us

When I finally crawled into bed at 11:30 last night, I realized how much fun the day was. While I'm transitioning into my specific training for IM Arizona, I've managed to get creative with my workouts.

Now I'm looking into shaping my lead up plans for Arizona. Race day is November 23rd and I think it's important to have a shootout race a few weeks beforehand to make sure the tank is firing and the training is soaking in. Right now I'm looking at Austin 70.3, Soma Half, or American Zofingen as potential lead in races.

All for now,
lf

water polo

After 24 Hours of Triathlon and Ironman Canada, I opted to take a mental break and have been playing some water polo. As there is not a large following here in Colorado, i've managed to hook up with a few ex-high school and college water polo players in town and we meet up and work on shooting and passing. There is no deep water pool in town, so this past Monday David Walker and I drove down to Denver U to play with the masters team there.


What a workout as we spent the entire hour-and-a-half scrimmaging. This meant non-stop treading water and bursts of sprinting. It's a 40-minute drive away but we will play in a tournament in mid-October so I'd like to keep playing at least once/week until then.

I tried convincing Emily how tough it is to play and what great shape you have to be in, but she holds steadfast that water polo players are the ones who couldn't handle the intensity of swimming as kids and liked to party too much. We'll agree to disagree on this one!

Ready, Aim, Fire

Yesterday was Leon's last day in Boulder as he had to cut his US season short to return to Melbourne, Australia due to a family emergency. So, we went all out and road five hours out past Carter Lake, up through Estes Park, and back down Hwy 36 back into Boulder. Our ride was an eventful one even though we tried leaving the house early enough -6:45AM- so we could have the roads to ourselves.

The fun started on the roads out by Carter Lake where we were riding single file when a suburban came up from behind, honked, and ran us into the ditch. Leon provided enough finger jesters for the both of us -- which was good because I was wearing Craft lobster finger gloves and could not relay an effective F-U. For being 8AM on a Saturday, the driver of this car must have serious self-esteem issues to bother two harmless cyclists. I hope karma is a bitch for you, whoever you are...

Next stop was Estes Park where I was looking forward to a hot vanilla latte. I had spent the previous two hours staring at Leon's wheel - I can provide you all the details; Continental Duraskin tire, Shimano wheel, etc, since I got to know that wheel intimately following it for so long. We severely underestimated the dedication of folks of Scottish heritage. When we rolled into Estes Park, which plays host to one of the largest Scottish festivals in the US. There were traffic jams everywhere and the main street in downtown was blocked to make way for thousands of marching kilt wearing, bagpipe blowing, parade marchers.

Since we couldn't get to Kind Coffee (my motivation to make it up the 20-miles of climbing) we resorted to our backup plan of the Phillips gas station. In honor of Craig "Mad Dog" McKenzie, I scarfed down two bags (2 for $1.00) of Blue Gummi Sharks. Once back on our bikes, we faced a four mile climb back out of Estes before the long 22-mile downhill into Lyons.

While we were passing by the Estes Lake, the kilted Scots moved onto their next game - Shooting live cannon balls at inflatable Lochness Monsters!! Talk about getting our heart rate and blood flowing again - we laughed about getting chased out of town by cannon ball fire!

An uneventful downhill got us into Lyons and back onto Hwy 36 for the 14 miles back into Boulder. While we were moving back at snails pace on one of the uphills (36 is a deceitful route to return to town after a long ride) we saw an amazing horned elk sprinting (in the form of bounding) from the opposite side of the highway. He leaped over one barbed wire fence, through the ditch, over the road - thankfully no cars or bikes got in his way, passed 10 meters in front of us, down through the ditch, over another fence, and sprinted 400 meters straight up into the foothills. What an amazing creature!

We said goodbye to Leon for the summer but look out for this guy to start rocking the Ironman circuit when he steps foot on the Western Australia course this December. But, he'll have to battle it out with our other Aussie housemate, Gavin Scott, who should be coming into good form about that time.