Fish Time

People always ask me what I eat.  The answer is seafood and produce.  I also eat eggs, nuts, poultry occasionally and I love wine.  Sometimes I eat treats--last night I had fro yo and I topped it with a bunch of candy. Major sugar hangover today!  No grains unless I'm at a dinner party, no sugar except on long rides, and no processed crap.  Ever.

San Diego is a great place to live for someone who eats like me.  There is an abundance of fresh produce and seafood.  I love seafood!  My favorite fish guy, Poppa Mark (www.poppasfreshfish.com) offers a FishScription.  Kinda like a CSA, but for fish!  Every week, I pick up a box of mixed fish and shellfish for only $25!  It's always fresh, sustainable, wild and amazing.  Fish is a great source of protein and nutrients.  Good for the brain (important for nerds), good for the body (important for triathletes).   Nerdjock food.  It's my favorite source of protein and I eat it about 5 times per week. Here are some of the awesome seafood meals I've made with fresh seafood from Poppa's:

Yes, I ate both of those lobsters and they were scrumptious!

Seared mahi with roasted asparagus and sauteed mushrooms

This was a good one!  Steamed rock crab, fresh mackerel (caught that morning) roasted with lemons and a squeeze of blood orange juice and roasted mushrooms.  I had a salad on the side.

I hate it when people post food pictures where they didn't present the food well and now I find myself doing the same thing. These are just pics of my dinner plate, not nicely presented food.  Don't judge!

Biking Badassness

Happy Monday!  Oh, yeah, ugh, Monday!

We had the most gorgeous weekend here!  Sorry, cold weather people!

Saturday: 80.88 mile ride. Fast!
Saturday morning I met up with some Team Badass people to ride up the coast.  We started in Solana Beach and rode north through Carlsbad and Oceanside, across Camp Pendleton, through the San Onofre Beach park to San Clemente and back.  This route is super fun and flat but windy.  For the first half of the ride, I was donk chasing my girls Lauren and Rene.  Those two are smokin' fast!  Kinda nuts since Rene just had a baby 8 months ago and already has abs that are far superior to any I've ever had.  Even though I was going as fast as possible, over 20 mph in some sections (!), they were still way, far ahead.  I like chasing.  It keeps me working hard.  The headwind killed me on the way back and my pace slowed quite a bit, but I still averaged over 17 mph for the entire ride, which I will definitely take!  My Infinit worked really well and I never bonked, cramped or felt hungry.  I did, however, manage to get a bit of a sunburn. Must wear sunscreen!

One of the highlights was chicking a dude that hated to be chicked over and over again.  He was kinda strange.  Riding a Cervelo P3, so nice bike, but he had frat boy shamrock Lucky boxers on under his shorts.  Ouch!  Sore balls and chafed taint were his just rewards.

Sunday: 34.5 mile ride.  Slow and hilly.
I'm going out of town next weekend and won't have a chance to ride, so I swapped my normal Sunday long run for yet another bike ride.  I was tired when I woke up super early Sunday morning (thanks daylight savings time!) but excited to ride.  My friend and team mate mapped out a super evil route that had 2600 feet of climbing in 34 miles, with almost all of it in the first half, including a monster climb out to Ramona.  I was extra excited for this ride because Luke joined us for his first ride in quite a while.  Poor guy!  This was a rough ride back.

I was kind of stupid Sunday morning and left my water bottles sitting by the front door.  You know, leave important stuff in an obvious place so you don't forget it!  Didn't work.  I also assumed it wouldn't be too cold and wore just a sleeveless jersey with arm warmers.  Once we go to the meet-up point, Inh informed me that it was going to be 45 in Ramona.  Well, crap.  I found a sweatshirt in the back of my car and put that on.  I looked like a total newb, but Inh was wearing one, too, so he was my dork partner.  Luke is always cold, so we was dressed appropriately and got to give me a bit of shit about not listening to him.  hahaha.

My butt was very sore and my legs were tired, but I took it easy and powered through.  Gorgeous ride and the complete opposite of Saturday's.  Saturday was all about the ocean and Sunday was all about the back country.  Lots of farms and monster hills.  There were some pretty awesome descents.  We all finished and celebrated with giant breakfast burritos from a local Mexican place.  Sooooo good!

Sunday night, I had ladies' dinner club and I was the host.  The theme was Spanish tapas.  Everyone brought really excellent dishes and we sat around the pub table and drank lots and lots of Sangria and nibbled on great tapas.  Here's my contribution to the dinner:

Mmmmmmm...sangria!

Close-up of the drunken fruit heaven

Let's just say there was no way I was making it to the pool this morning.  116 miles of bike riding in the sun + lots of sangria = no training and lots of sleep and hydration!

Black Mountain and the Mustachioed Girl

It was definitely a Black Mountain kind of weekend.

You already know that Friday I did a crazy, super hard Black Mountain trail run.  I woke up sore on Saturday, which was awesome.  I'm never sore after runs.  I met some friends for another Black Mountain trail run.  I only had about 4 miles in me this time and it was still tough.  Since it was a shorter run, I brought both pig ninjas.  Rudy had a lot of fun, but I think Hank was tired from Friday still.  Very fun but my legs were super sore.  Of course, I had to wear my special undies and compression socks outfit and watch the hummingbirds in the back yard.  One of my cycling buddies, Paul (aka Liver) was teasing me about how my neighbors must think I'm crazy because I sit in the back yard in my undies and those crazy neon compression socks all the time.  Hahahahhaha.  That's what they get for being peeping neighbors!

Sunday morning I was supposed to ride the Great Western Loop with Team Badass, but I slept through my alarm.  So sad!  Of course, this led to a couple of hours of trying to convince myself to ride solo vs. riding the trainer vs. sitting on the couch.  Why is it always so hard to convince myself to ride solo?  I like it!  Finally I made it outside and rode from my house up to Black Mountain, out to Rancho Bernardo and then back through Del Mar Heights and back home.  Forty-ish mile loop with a good amount of climbing.  My legs felt pretty solid, though I could tell they were tired when I was climbing.  I had to hustle, hustle, hustle on the way back because my friends Li and Paul were waiting for me at the Indian buffet.  Of course, I missed a turn, which made me late and set me up for some additional climbing.  I made it home finally, jumped in Willie (my car) and, literally, ran into the restaurant...still in my biking gear and covered in sweat.  You're welcome, fellow restaurant goers.  Of course, it was a super awesome Indian restaurant and I was the only white person there, so I stood out anyway.  Always a  good sign to go to an ethnic restaurant where there are no white people! The food was excellent and I was super full.

One highlight of my Sunday ride was the chase with the mustachioed girl.  As I was riding along, I approached another rider and, as I'm a courteous cyclist, called out "On your left!"  I looked over as I passed and was surprised to see that I was passing a very lean woman with a full blonde mustache.  Not a man; definitely a woman with a stache!  It was very fair blonde color and rather think and full.  Unfortunately, the mustachioed lady was not as nice as her mustache and refused to make eye contact.  Apparently, she was quite unhappy about being passed and started to do that ever annoying bastard move of running through stop signs and red lights (I do this, too, sometimes but not when there are cars around) when there were cars just to get ahead.  Of course, I would then pass her back once I got going again.  Very dumb.  Maybe it was roid rage?

Chiro update: I found a nice chiropractor who did not own and alien gun and he did the snap crackle pop on my back.  I now feel much better.  He told me that I need some deep tissue work so make my neck 100%.  Not fun.  Must make appointment.

Took yesterday off.  Did a short 4.6 miler with the pig ninjas this morning.  Fun!

Friday update

Yay!  It's FRIDAY!!!

I woke up crazy early this morning (4:30 am.  What is it about 5:00 am that's fine but the 4 in front makes it terrible?) to run a 15K (~10 mile) loop at Black Mountain. I met up with my friend and teammate Ian (he and another Team Badass guy write a blog.  It's fun.  You should check it out: thereisnotri.org) so he could show me the run.  Now, Ian is really fast, like 1:26 half marathon fast.  I'm slow.  He was nice enough to slow down so that I could chase him on the trail.  It was an awesome morning.  Started in the dark, saw the sun rise and finished early.  The trail was up and down, up and down, with a few almost-mountains thrown in.  I had to walk a few of the steeper hills and by mile 9, I was shelled.  I had to walk the last 3/4 mile, which was uphill.  At the end, I felt like I had run a marathon.  No joke.  It was that tough.  Trail running is much more fun, though.  Pig ninja Hank had fun, too, and had no issues finishing the run.  Maybe 4 legs help on hills.

Hank and I hit up Starbucks on the way home.  We split a wrap and I drank a bottle of water (started it in line), a Naked Fruit drink and a Venti latte.  I was thirsty and hot and cold and hungry and MUDDY!  I had about a pound of mud caked to each shoe and a trail of mud up the back of my tights.

Now I'm sitting in the lab in my extra lovely yoga pants + compression socks get-up and I feel great.

On Wednesday, I went to a ladies' night at the office of our new tri club sponsor, who is a chiropractor.  Now, in general, I think chiropractors are full of crap.  However, this guy bribed us with wine, snacks, paraffin hand treatments and massages.  Okay!  I'm in.  I met my friend and Team You Got Chicked mate there.  Turns out we were the only new people who showed up.  Everyone else either works there or is a current client.  WTF?!  This chiro was definitely one of the bad chiros.  He was greasy and d-baggy and ridiculous.  He kept trying to convince us of his powers and scientific abilities (don't try this with 2 PhD scientists who are also athletes unless you know your stuff).  Then, at the end, he pulled out his weird alien gun to "interrupt nerve impulses to reset our nerves."  I think that's what he said.

Leslie and the alien gun

WTF are you doing to me, crazy man?!!!!

There were also a couple of vendors.  One woman was selling things that smelled very nice.  She was fine.  The other woman was selling some sort of nutrition system.  It consisted of a "cleanse" that could take tons of weight off.  Don't even get me started with that!  Such a load of shit.  Her other product was a "sports" drink.  It hardly had any sodium or potassium in in.  I'm pretty sure it was Tang with a vitamin dissolved in it.

So, all that said, I'm going to a chiropractor tonight.  Sometimes my spine gets misaligned and it gives me sciatica.  I've been to an osteopathic physician for it and all he's done is adjust it, so I think a good chiro can do the same thing.  My neck is really tight and sore, too, so I help the adjustment takes care of that.

Super fun weekend on tap. More trail running tomorrow and the Great Western Loop on Sunday.  Yippeee!

Weekend Warriors

I had a great weekend of training.  I'm quite tired this morning and will take today as a rest day.

Saturday, I met with team badass members at 6:30 in Rancho San Diego so we could roll by 7:00 am.  This part of San Diego is called East County and is very hilly.  The route we followed is the Great Southern Loop.  We rode east up some big hills (mountains) and then headed south to Mexico.  Seriously, I saw Mexico.  Closest I've ever been to the border.  This part of the ride was very interesting, as it was a bit sketchy and most of us were a bit worried about getting jacked.  Nice bikes were not common in this area.  We made it though!  We then rode along the water as we went north through Imperial Beach and then cut through Chula Vista and had to do some climbing before we finished.  There were so many turns on the route sheet that it took up 2 pages.  I made two wrong turns but, fortunately, figured it out without adding too much mileage.  Afterward, I ate a big fish burrito.  Awesome!  73 miles total.

I was completely toast after the ride and spent the rest of the night lounging on the couch.  I need to start making plans after rides so I don't turn into a blob.

Sunday morning, I was up early again to meet my friend and Team Badass teammate, Li for a run through the trails of Rancho Penasquitos Canyon.  Yes, this is my favorite place to run and it's close to my house.   We took the run pretty easy and I felt great.  Li runs up the big hills, though, so I had to run up them, too. Normally, I act like a baby and walk.  No more!  I definitely felt better than last week and am ready to add some distance.  8.05 miles total.

Here's the plan for the week:
today (Monday): rest, glorious rest
Tuesday: 1:30 bike, 4 mile run
Wednesday: 5 mile run, masters' swim
Thursday: 1:00 bike, 4 mile run
Friday: 5 mile run, masters' swim
Saturday: long run, shooting for a 10 miler
Sunday: long bike, I think we're gonna do the Great Western Loop (about 50 miles with 5000 feet of climbing)

Really Weird IM dream

So, dreams and nightmares about the Ironman are common as the triathlon season progresses.  I've had many nightmares about missing cutoffs or not being able to find the transition areas or forgetting my bike or all kinds of other crazy stuff.  Also important to note, since I stopped eating gluten and sugar (for the most part), my dreams have become really, really vivid.  Not sure if there's a connection or not.  Last night, I had the weirdest Ironman dream ever.

I was doing IM CdA and Lionel Richie was there, wearing a lavender jumpsuit with turquoise accents and a large and strange collar.  Weird enough, right?  Sure, but in my dream, Lionel Richie was a serial killer who killed spectators.  He would greet them at the top of every small hill with a "Hello is it me you're waiting for?" and then kill them.  NO JOKE!  This really happened in my dream and it seemed real as I was dreaming it.  Then he approached me as I was deep into the dark place on the run (all you IMers know what I'm talking about) and I said, "Don't even think about killing me.  I'm too busy for that shit!"  Ahahahahahhahaha!!!!!!!

Oh, Lionel!

The second crazy thing to happen in this dream was the race director informed us that we must all catch fish during the swim portion and that the fish we caught were the only things we were allowed to eat during the race!  Really weird dream!

I was trying to figure out what inspired the dream.  Here's what I came up with:

• I watched Dexter before bed: that explains the serial killer part
• I ate fish for dinner: that explains the fish part
• I'm very busy: that explains the no time for your killing bullshit part
• I'm kinda obsessed with Ironman training: okay, I get the IM part

BUT WTF EXPLAINS THE LIONEL RICHIE PART?!!!  A very creepy dream.  My friend, Alyssa, stated that this dream may be creepier than the movie the Ice Cream Man.  That movie was about a demented ice cream man who kills people and turns them into ice cream.  There's a very disturbing scene involving rocky road ice cream and a delicious eyeball marshmallow.  I think we were in about 7th grade when we watched this movie at my house with our other friend, Abbey. Not so sure it was a good movie, but definitely the creepiest thing ever... until I had a Lionel Richie singing before killing Ironman dream.  I'm the new sicko.

SLAYER

When you're a triathlete, there are many people who are important in your journey: friends, family, significant others, dogs, mentors, etc.  Right after I signed up for IM CdA, I was lucky enough to find a mentor.  He's a great source of wisdom, smack talk and calls me out on bullshit and excuses.


Yep, I'm talking about this guy:

Last year when I was just starting out on the Ironman journey, I joined a mentor thread on BeginnerTriathlete.  It turned out to be very helpful.  We all exchanged ideas and training strategies and funny stories.  The mentor, Slayer, is crazy badass.  He's into insane volume and it works for him.  He's a reformed porkchop who's earned serious tri points, including a propensity for trying to scare the race director when he podiums (finishes in the top 3 or 4 of his division).  The thread has started up again and I'm on it, along with a few other people from last year and some new folks, too.  It's so nice to have a group of other crazies who love to talk about tri stuff.

One of the things Slayer asked of me was to post some lessons I learned from my last IM.  This is what I wrote:

Yes, IM #1 was a great eye opener.  This will be a brutally honest assessment.  Here is a list of things I learned/changes I need to make:

The Swim:

• must swim much, much more!  I really don't care much for swimming, but I need to make myself do this.
• my IM swim was pathetic (2 hours) and miserable.
• Starting in January, I'm going to start swimming with the UCSD masters' team.  Swimming with a masters' team helps me so much.  Unfortunately, once things start going well, I tend to convince myself that I can swim on my own.  Then I start slacking again.
• Lessons!  I have a swim coach picked out for a few lessons to help my stroke.

The bike:

• Last time I trained on my own. Entirely.  That allowed me to ride slowly, skip rides, start rides too late so I couldn't fit in all the mileage, wuss out on tough rides, etc.  This time, I formed a team, called Team Badazz, with whom to ride.  Several of the team members are much faster than I, so I've been improving already.  My average speed is up around 17mph now, and that's with a lot of climbing.  My goal is to do 18 mph + for Vineman.  It's also much more fun to ride with my team.
• No shying away from hard rides!  We've been doing some tough rides.  Just conquered a 7 mile climb a couple of weekends ago.
• I need a new bike.  Yes, I know it's the engine and not the equipment, but I rode the ish out of my bike and it's old.  I have my eye on a couple of bikes (and the cash set aside) and will purchase next month.  My old bike had a couple of mechanical issues that killed my ride last year (including the shifter falling apart and then I couldn't shift for about 45 miles).  Kinda proud that I wore that bike out 

The Run:

• Not so worried about this.  I was a runner before I got into tris.  My plan is to follow my Be Ironfit plan for this.  Also will be running with Team Badazz.
• Need a new plan for tri shorts--I had a wicked case of baboon butt after CdA.
• This year I will do some peak runs in the heat.  The avg temps in Napa are around 90-95+ in July, so I need to be prepared.

In general, I just need to be much more hardcore and train a lot more.  No more slacking!  I know you all will help keep me accountable 

The common thread to all of this is that I need more volume (of course, I've already altered some of the above plans so I'm more hardcore).  Slayer has been saying this from day one.  I didn't listen last season, but I'm listening now.  I'm ready to prove what I can do.  I'm well on my way to having a great season and look forward to seeing the volume pile up.  See?  No excuses!

So, thanks mentor thread and big thanks to the big Slayer man!  Hope to race with you again soon.