JOURNEYS OF A TRIATHLETE FATHER OF FIVE

Vegans, Beer 4-Packs, And Training!

2012-02-01T14:39:00.000-05:00

"If God didn't want us to eat animals, why did he make them out of meat.?" — Homer J. Simpson

As much as I love Israeli couscous and quinoa, I start salivating like Pavlov's dog at the mere thought of a strip steak.

I do not really understand vegetarianism, let alone, vegans. I have listened to arguments about health benefits of vegetarianism for years from good friends who swear by it. I understand ideological vegans and vegetarians, but some can be a bit judgmental and militant towards us omnivores. My wife recently found herself in the middle of a heated Facebook exchange (as heated and serious as one can take a Facebook exchange) with a vegan who could not appreciate my wife's ignorance for ruining the world by eating animals. All I have to say to this is ... really?

Do you drive a car? Do you put gas in it? A bicycle? Does it have parts that were manufactured in a factory? Do you make your own clothing? Oh, you do? From hemp? What do you use to sew it? A sewing machine? A needle manufactured in a factory in China? Unless an ideological vegan is prepared to live off the grid, eat only local ingredients, make their own clothes, dig their own wells, and live without indoor plumbing, please do not judge my wife. Or, if you do, prepare to be judged yourself. Pick your battles. I do not often stand atop the soap box, but I really get irked by the shortsightedness and hypocritical thinking by some folks.

All I know is that after 3000 yards in the pool, or by mile 10 of a long run, I start visualizing and smelling cheeseburgers.

This can not be a coincidence.

Speaking of the pool, I had a really great second swim test this past week. I guess I should preface by saying I have never been a really efficient swimmer. I have only been swimming as long as I have been doing triathlons, which is six seasons. Before beginning triathlons, I was the guy who use to swim flinging his head from side to side keeping it above the water, or bury my face in the water and kick like hell and fling my arms in front of me with the hope that I might be getting somewhere quickly. What the hell was I thinking?

But I digress...

I shaved 18 seconds off my previous 400 time trial time. 18 seconds!

1 went from a 7:15's, all the way down to two consecutive 6:57's. That is good improvement for me.

The crazy part is that I feel that my effort has not nearly been as hard. I have learned how to re-relax in the pool while I am swimming. As a musician, I can attest to there being some similarities between performing on your instrument and training. As a pianist performing concert repertory, you have to make a conscious effort to continue to relax while you are playing—especially difficult passages. Improvisation can be even more mentally demanding. It is is one thing to play repertory form the printed page, but it is a completely different thing to compose "on the spot" in front of an audience while you are performing jazz. Nothing really prepares you for that like practicing technique and understanding the theory of jazz improvisation, but relaxation is key to this as well. Young jazz musicians will often feel the need to play too much, or continue to introduce new ideas rather than expanding on ones they have already stated. A more experienced player will allow space, and time for musical ideas to develop without being nervous about their audience. You have to trust your instinct, follow your own trajectory, rather than being worried how the music is being perceived in the moment.

So, my swimming has borrowed a page out of my musical playbook: "Allow it to happen."

RANDOMNESS:

BEER: What the hell is up with my favorite beers now being sold in four packs? I want MORE of a good thing, not less!

It happened first with Young's Double Chocolate Stout, followed soon after by Brooklyn Brewery's Black Chocolate Stout. To my knowledge, my favorite beer on planet Earth, or any other planet for that matter, Sam Smith's Oatmeal Stout has never been sold in a six pack, only four packs. Is it something specific to stouts? Are beer companies worried about the caloric intake of stout drinkers specifically?

NETFLIX: Yeah, so I recently discovered Netflix. Perhaps you've heard of it? For the past couple of years, I have been searching for ways to make my tedious long weekend trainer rides to seem a little less.... tedious. Music in my ears does not work, nor does reading. Although, I did read much of books six and seven of the Harry Potter series while working up a nice sweat. I am not sure whether my heart rate use to elevate because of my hatred of Voldermort, or because I was actually working hard. This brings me to my next random topic:

SPARTACUS: I am a sucker for those sword and sandal type films. You know, Gladiator, Clash of the Titans, Alexander, etc. I recently started watching the new Spartacus series—based on the legend of the famous Thracian leader who led his army of slaves against the the Roman Empire—on Netflix while on my trainer. It is everything I could ever want in a program for my long rides. There is plenty of gratuitous sex, graphic violence, and poor acting. What I find the most difficult to understand is how every single male gladiator and slave in the show are incredibly jacked for performance enhancing drugs. Seriously, how are these guys 6'2, 240, incredibly ripped with six packs while seemingly be limited to about an 800 calorie a day diet. More, they show these cats bare chested in the middle of winter crawling on the side of a mountain in the snow. They are not shivering. They barely notice that it is even cold, because their giant muscles and underdeveloped gladiator brains—and an apparent slight neurological problem not being be able to feel pain or cold—has left them unfettered by these minor nuisances.

...and one more thing. Since when did these women have breast implants in ancient Roman times? Seriously! If you are doing a period piece, it is difficult to take it seriously when there is more silicon in the breasts of some of the actresses than all of the semi-conductor industry.

TRAINING: Training has been going unbelievably well. As in, I am doing it. Consistently. Perhaps that is why I have not been around as much as of late. I know... I know.. I use these lame excuses like having five children, blah blah blah, and a job that comes home with me every night (i.e. grading papers), blah blah blah, and a training schedule that I try to fit in to a ver busy professional life. LISTEN... I am NOT complaining. I am the luckiest human being on Earth. I have an unbelievably patient wife. Speaking of which, my wife has resurrected her amazing dance career and has been performing quite frequently after taking several years "off" to have children. I am quite proud of what she is able to do.

RUN ACROSS AMERICA: You know what is really, really, really cool about the REV3 race series?

Answer: Everything.

But, do you know what else?

The amazing folks over at REV3 have decided to run across America. I know, how lame. I mean, they are going to just run across America once? How many times did Forest Gump run across the United States? The REV3 goal is to raise $100,000 for the Ulman Cancer Fund. I know that we have all been affected by cancer. I lost a lot of people I love dearly, especially my father, to cancer.

What's that? You say you want to do your small part to kick cancer's ass?

Do your part here, would ya?

REVIEW: I have an unbelievably kick-butt review coming up in my next blog post. Trust me, it's a winner.

Train Smart!

2012: A Fresh Perspective

2012-01-18T16:32:00.005-05:00

It is a new year.

I am a little wiser.

Where have I been again?

Well, for starters, I put a lot of "time in the bank" at home over the winter recess. I know how incredibly busy my semester is going to be, so I wanted to make sure that I got to spend a lot of time with the kiddies.

<--- This is a picture of my girls and me playing the game Headbandz. You put a card in the headband and try to guess what it could be by asking questions before the time runs out. It is silly and fun, and my girls love playing it, which means, I love playing it.

Over the break, we all spontaneously decided that we would take a rock climbing safety course. I have never tried rock climbing. Neither has wifey. We are both semi-afraid of heights. I've learned that rock climbing is really good fun and a good way to keep upper body strength. We've learned that we have some various degree of spidery children among us. All but my youngest could take the course. It is mere matter of being able to fit in the climbing belts. My twins barely fit.

I also have been writing and performing quite a bit. Wifey dances with a regional modern dance company called BIODANCE. I wrote and performed a piece with them recently in Brooklyn. Working with wifey is fun. It gives us the opportunity to spend some quality time with each other while seeing some really cool places (and drinking some kick-ass beer).

How hysterical is the painting on the wall of this restaurant that we went to in Brooklyn??!! Nothing says classy like pole dancing.

Observations:

• Uncle Ben (and Voltaire) were correct— "With great power comes great responsibility."

• There exists an inverse relationship between the number of children I have and the amount of hair I have left.

• On the way home in the car the other night from the gym, I looked out the window of our mom-mobile and commented on how beautiful the moon looked. The full moon shone brightly, unobstructed by any clouds. Then, out of the blue, Luca asks me, "what is mooning?" I caught wifeys eyes out of the corner of mine and we gave each other a quick look. So, I proceeded to tell the kids what mooning meant.

There was a pause.

Finally, Julian—the second oldest—says, "Dad, I bet you would like it if mommy did that to you."

Wise man, that Julian.

He's right.

Kids 5k:

I don't know what exactly prompted discussion, or who brought it up, but there was a 5k race last weekend in town that my kids asked if they could run. Over the summer, they have run some "kid fun runs." Neither of them ever did a run over one mile. Wifey was skeptical. I got the, "Mark, do you really think that they are capable of running a 5k? That is really far. I did not see any reason why they could not just go out there, run/jog/walk slowly if they needed and have a good time with their old man. So, we went and made it in a nick of time.

It was really cute. Both of them wanted to start up in the front, but dad convinced them that we should start near the back and pass everyone along the way.

So, this is how the race went down:

Luca—as he always does—started like a bat outta hell. Julian took it slow and steady. He managed to run the first two miles nice and steady, but at the first long steep hill had to walk a little bit. I stayed with him the whole time reassuring him that it was okay to walk. He continued running again shortly after that and he managed to catch his older brother. Nice!

Both of them got first time 5k medals, and Julian finished 3rd in the 0-10 age group. He just turned eight. He was super excited to get a ribbon and a medal!

The boys have been asking me when we are going to run another 5k.

Bikes:

Bikes! Wifey and I decided that our Christmas present to the children this year would be to bite the bullet and buy brand new bikes that were worthy of the hills and bike trails around our new house. Wifey pointed out that she thought it was fair considering that their father now owned three really nice bikes. Don't tell the wifey, but I am in the market for a 29'er. My friend EJ over at Crankskins has convinced me that I need to get on a mountain bike and experiencing the thrill of ~~crashing into trees~~ cross training.

Oddly, I started my love of cycling by mountain biking. When I was a student, I founded the "Adventure Club" on campus. We would go white water rafting, spelunking, skydiving, etc. One of the greatest trips I ever scheduled for the club was to Snowshoe, West Virginia to go mountain bike riding. Let's face it, West Virginia is really just a giant adult playground. Seriously, have you ever been there? Morgantown—where West Virginia University is located—was/is the most metropolitan "city" in West Virginia. Even Morgantown had a real "you might run into Davy Crockett" sometime soon sort of feel to it. It was the only place that I have ever been in North America where coonskin caps are still in style.

Inspiration:

You know, I remember once asking my father on my 35th Birthday if he would like to be thirty-five again. He was seventy -five years old then. His eyebrows furrowed and he looked at me quizzically and said "Mark, I would like to be sixty-five again." I thought that was a hysterical and unexpected answer.

As we continued talking, he explained that even though his body was not able to do the same things it once could, that his mind still believed that anything was possible. He used the example of the ottoman that lay in front of his chair and said, "Look at that. In my head, I know I can jump over that. I have memory over me doing that very thing. But I know that if I try to do it, I am going to kill myself."

As my father was telling me this, I couldn't help but think of Lew Hollander—the eighty year old, who in 2010 finished the Ironman World Championships in Kona in 15:48:30, knocking off more than an hour from his finish the previous year.

The mind is amazing. What you believe you can do is sometimes more important than your ability to actually to be physically capable. It is my belief that persistence trumps talent. Perseverance is the secret to discovering new talent within ourselves. Pushing ourselves past the point that we thought we were capable of allows us to believe that even more is possible.

What I learned from my father was that people who are successful in life are often not the most talented in their discipline, but they are the people who outwork everyone else. They don't complain how tired they are. They continue to work, to learn, never resting on their laurels, never compromising the integrity of their work, and above all else, always remaining humble.

They don't give reasons why something can not be done, but rather, ask, "how am I going to solve this problem? How am I going to make it work?" When everyone is debating whether it is a glass half full, or half empty, they've already drank the water.

TRAINING:

Training has left me reenergized. I have made some really decent strides with my swimming over the last month. After six seasons of learning how to swim, I think I am starting to finally realize what people mean by "the feel of the water." Hey, better late than never, right?

My body has been pretty tired as a result of bumping up the training volume a bit earlier this year. I am scheduled for my first triathlon at Rev3 Quassay, where I will race the Olympic distance.

My biking seems to be the thing I need to work on the most, although I recently discovered Netflix!

Yes, yes... I know what you are all thinking... recently??!! I mean, we've always known about Netflix, but wifey and I have finally decided to try it out. Can I just tell you how much faster Netflix makes my trainer time go?

A lot!

Tomorrow is my first day back teaching classes after a nice, long break.

I get to teach History of Rock and Roll (at 8:45 in the morning!)

Rock on!

Some awesome news happening soon. Looking forward to sharing.

Train Smart!

Lazer Helmet Give Away: And The Winner Is...

2011-12-21T09:39:00.002-05:00

Congratulations to some chick named Laura Wheatley. She is the proud new owner of a Lazer Tardiz helmet. The rest of you should be green with envy.

Thank you to everyone who signed up to participate in the giveaway. I appreciate your PATIENCE more than you know.

I started getting some messages on "the" Facebook from followers asking if they had won. Thank you for stalking me. The last couple of weeks have been crazy. I just got all of my grades in yesterday. As much as I love spending time adding and subtracting numbers, grading is the last glamorous part of a college professor's job. Plus, my ass has been busy training once again. I am really getting back into the swing of things after a month and a half of relative laziness. Know how that feels? Yeah. Like you've been hit by a truck. Around ten o'clock at night, my energy level resembles that of a tree sloth.

Congratulations Laura. Send me an email to let me know which Lazer helmet you would like.

A BIG THANK YOU to Lazer for allowing me to have this super-awesome giveaway on my blog.

For anyone who did not win, have no fear! Contact me about how you can receive a 20% discount on a new Lazer helmet!

More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five: The Top Five Greatest Tunes About Rock n' Roll

2011-12-16T08:44:00.001-05:00

The Friday Top Five: The Top Five Greatest Tunes About Rock n' Roll

As someone who actually teaches a course titled "The History of Rock and Roll," I feel a unique sense of entitlement with all things rock& roll. In fact, I have self-appointed myself the absolute authority on all things rock and roll. I mean, after all, Michael Jackson dubbed himself "The King of Pop," and Howard Stern declared he was "The King of All Media," why should I not be Dr. Rock and Roll? I mean let's face it, I even have the official name plate on my door.

I know I will receive some comments and other suggestions for this list... I'm looking at you Jeff and Rock Star.

Picking the five best songs ever written about rock and roll is a lot like picking my favorite dish containing lobster. I mean, does it matter? I heard a comedian once talk about how lobsters completely got the short end of the stick. He went on to say, "...when God was creating all the animals, he said, "Okay, lobster. I'm going to make you red, and give you these little claw things on the front. Yeah, that's it. (muffled voice) Oh, yeah, and the most intelligent creatures on the planet are going to find you absolutely delicious."

I decided to base my list on songs that really celebrate rock and roll for what it is; a subversive, ass-kicking, stick-it-to-the-man, in-your-face, "My amplifier goes to eleven," form of musical expression.
I had to eliminate tunes with "Rock and Roll" in the title that were played by fringe rock and roll bands at best, like The Velvet Underground. I love the Velvet Underground, but they are about as rock & roll to me as say, The Cure, or Elvis Costello.

So, I had to rule out tunes like "I'm Just a Singer in a Rock and Roll Band" by the Moody Blues, and "So You Want to Be A Rock and Roll Star" by Tom Petty. While peripherally tunes about rock and roll, they do not speak to the true nature of what it means to bang your head and feel the power of guitar distortion.

5) For Those About to Rock, AC/DC: How cool is it that those of us who have never served in the armed forces can still be saluted? This tune from the 1981 album of the same name features starts with lead singer, Brian Johnson, engaged with a little antiphonal (call and response) between himself and the band. The music is raw, heavy, heavily influenced by R& B guitar licks that are predictable, but tasty.

4) I Love Rock and Roll, Joan Jett: This tune feels nostalgic because her lyrics "I love rock and roll, so put another dime in the jukebox baby. I love rock n' roll, so come an' and take your time an' and dance with me" harkens back to a time when you could actually pay for tunes on the jukebox without having to take out your ATM card and take money out.

3) Rock and Roll Music, Chuck Berry, Look, Chuck Berry is unequivocally the architect of rock and roll. There would be no rock guitar if it were not for Chuck Berry. Who would the Beatles cover, and Brian Wilson—of the Beach Boys—rip off if were not for Chuck Berry? He explains in the song how rock&roll has a backbeat, and if you want to dance with him, it has to be rock& roll music that you're listening to.

2) Long Live Rock, The Who: A tribute to rock and roll artists dead or alive, this tune mixes some honkey tonk, with good ole' fashion ass-kickin' rock and roll to reaffirm that rock and roll is here to stay.

1) Rock and Roll, Led Zepplin: Proof that when you spend enough time away from rock n' roll, you really need it. I feel this way every morning when I need my jazz fix. I have to sit down at the piano in the a.m. and unleash some demons. I spend and hour and a half playing tunes, improvising, and getting my daily therapy before I go out there and face the ever-increasing sarcasm of la vie quotidienne.

TRAINING:

Hey, guess what? My ass is IN gear and I am training hard again. This year, it does not appear that I will be facing some of the same kinds of stresses as previous seasons. Let me recap the last two seasons for you:

2009: My father passes away a day before his 81'st birthday. It came unexpectedly. This put a bit of a damper in my training. I ran the Musselman HIM less than two weeks later.

2010: Left a steady academic position I was in for ten years after completing my doctorate to take a one year position and pray that it would turn into something more permanent. It did. The stress of applying for gigs, and reapplying for my position left me spent and struggling to find time last season. Had an injury that kept me from running for about eight weeks. Oh, I decided to coach my son's baseball team last summer. What the hell was I thinking?

2011: Have some major writing to do this year. I have a couple of huge commissions on the burner that I have to get done. Unfortunately, I prefer writing and training in the morning. Finding balance is going to be difficult.

Coach Kelly has me hitting it pretty hard already. I like that. There is something to be said for ramping up slowly, but I really dislike waiting until, say, April to start having any significant long runs.

I did a 2800 yard swim yesterday, followed by an hour of interval work on the bike. I have also been doing some weight training this pre-season. I use to be a strength athlete and I trained pretty hard. I miss pumping iron, but it has been a really long time since I've bench pressed, or did dumbbell flys and my chest is absolutely killing me.

I think I am going to run a 5K this weekend. It will be fun to go out there and really test myself early. I have not run a 5K in years. Isn't that crazy? I have been more interested in running 10K's. Something about going out there and running fast enough to elicit vomiting really scares the hell out of me. A little vomiting never hurt anyone.

I was pretty excited about my recent heart rate test. After warming up for 15 minutes and doing 3 short 30-second intervals, I ran hard for twenty minutes. I remember reading something years ago that someone wrote about how to run faster. This coach once said, "in order to run faster, you need to run faster," and that is exactly what I did.

I have to admit, I don't envy all of you who live in warm-weathered locales who have to deal with heat and humidity all year round, but I am not excited about having to sit my ass on a trainer in my basement during the winter. Ugh!

More soon. Train Smart!

Training is going swimmingly. Pun intended.

The Friday Top Five: The Top Five Things You Give Up When You Become A Parent

2011-12-04T13:31:00.001-05:00

5) Being Cool: Although some parents try desperately to remain cool by declaring to all the world that they would "would never be caught dead in a minivan," having an infant pee, poop, and vomit on you makes what type of ride you're rolling in the least of your problems. You have to worry about whether anyone at work can smell that vomit on your clothes because you were too tired to change them on account of staying up all night wondering why how your child will cry all evening for you then manage to sleep all afternoon when you need to run errands.

4) Listening to your music in the Car: I have tried desperately to indoctrinate my children to my musical aesthetic. It has worked for the most part. Sometimes, it is a little embarrassing. I mean, I remember my boys singing "Brass Monkey" at some pretty inopportune times as well. Now, my youngest wants to hear her Suzuki violin CD and everyone in the car will sing Lightly Row, Twinkle Little Star (to the rhythm of "Mississippi hotdog"—a personal favorite of mine). I have also listened to enough Disney tunes in the car with the kids that I have temporarily "misplaced" the CD... perhaps forever.

3) Reasoning: It is nearly impossible to try to reason with five year old. Their brains—although amazing sponges—do not function quite the same way as a fairly well-adjusted adult. I use "fairly adjusted" here, because, let's just face it, all of us are still recovering from the trauma of are dysfunctional childhoods. Children believe that are at the center of the universe and that everyone and everything should revolve around them. Forget trying to speak sensibly to a screaming toddler. What I have learned is that inconsolable screaming over
not having the right dinner fork or wrong socks to wear with their school clothes is usually a result of on of two things:

1) child is hungry
2) child is tired

Here is a diagram of how the average child thinks:

2) Sanity: Yeah, wifey and I left this at the turnstile long ago. (I am not even sure what that means). All I can attest to is that having young, fragile lives to take care of every second of the day is a daunting task. There are times when I have been so crazed trying to get the kids ready to do something that I leave the house without remembering to bring my computer, or lunch, or brain to work with me.

1) Sleeping In: Yeah, forget this completely. Sleeping in when you have small children means waking up past 7 a.m. I remember the first time we had to set a mandatory "sleep in" time with my oldest son. He came into our bedroom and climbed into bed with me and asked if we could go downstairs and play. It was 6:30. I said "No, buddy. We have to sleep until seven o'clock." He nestled in right next to me and went back to sleep.... or so I thought. As soon as the clock hit 7 a.m., he turned around with his
eyes wide open and said "Okay! It's seven o'clock daddy, let's go downstairs!" Ugh!

Training: Training is going pretty well, as in I am finally training and not just cobbling together a bunch of half-assed workouts and feeling good about myself. Guilt has a way of turning the screw and

My recent delve back into the world of training/self-flaggalation has been directly linked to a few different factors:

1) I was tired feeling like out-of shape. If I intend on keeping my ridiculous Ironman like diet (which I have absolutely no intention of departing with), then I thought that perhaps I should start training more consistently. I am self-motivated, but I needed some time off to regroup after Rev3 Full Cedar Point to reassess what I wanted to focus on this season.

2) I have a coach. I am now trained by Coach Kelly over at T2Multisport. The cool part about training with Kelly is that I have known her for a long time. We went to graduate school together some.... hmm, 12 years ago!

3) Work: This semester has been incredibly crazy, not to mention the fact that we moved twice in the span of two months. We are settled now, but it made training insane.

I have some lower back pain that I have been wrestling with. I could not figure out where it was coming from. I thought that perhaps it was a result of bumping up the training again. Wifey's back has also been hurting her. We have been giving each other nightly massages. Bonus.

Last night I finally figured out where all my pain is coming from. I knew that is must be some movement that I have been doing because it is really localized. While I sit in my office, I often throw my feet up on top of a chair—as I am sometimes sitting in front of my computer for hours out of my day—and write. Last evening, I noticed that my torso was having to twist around to put my feet up and that the numerous hours I have spent in that position have caused a great deal of pain. It reminded me of when I was a graduate student at the Ithaca Conservatory and I spent the summer painting houses. I was young then (with more hair), and I spent hours on a ladder painting trim with my arm stretched over my head. I didn't notice anything at the time until the next morning when I got up and my neck was absolutely killing me.

The Rest:

My youngest has graduated to her first real violin after spending a few weeks on the noodle-roni box. So awesome! Watch out, Vanessa Mae!

Lazer Awesomness! Tardiz Helmet Giveaway!

2011-12-01T10:59:00.001-05:00

Friends! (Triathlon nerds and their supporters)

Amazing news.

The fine folks over at Lazer have once again allowed me to giveaway another one of their super fast—and fashion conscious—Lazer Tardiz aero helmets.

In case you missed my review of the Lazer Tardiz helmet you can find it here.

ontzagwekkend! (Dutch for awesome, at least according to Google)

I find this funny, given that the Dutch word for "Awesomeness" according to Google, is "awesomeness." But I digress.

I decided that I wanted to do another giveaway via my blog because on any given day, about a quarter to half of the hits are from people going to the review of the Lazer helmet that I wrote. Surprisingly, I am unbelievably popular in Laos and Senegal. Who knew.

I love my Lazer helmet. It is zeer comfortabel!

So, here is the skinny:

1. Go to the Lazer website and then come back and leave a comment
telling me which Lazer Tardiz helmet design you like most AND when you would wear it. (1 entry)

2. Be a follower of my blog, leave a separate comment letting me know
who you are. (1 entry)

3. Become a fan of Lazer Helmets on Facebook. Leave a seperate
comment letting me know. (1 entry)

4. Post this contest on your blog, leave a separate comment letting meknow you've done so. (1 entry)

I will do a random drawing next Sunday, December 11th.

Good luck!

Blogs, Bambini, And Bonking And The Friday Top Five

2011-11-19T15:06:00.001-05:00

Blogs:

It's not me, it's you. Really.

Look, it's not that I don't love you, it is just that I need a better way of managing all of my fellow bloggers. Currently, I sift through ALL 170 of my dedicated followers and try to hit each of the blogs on a rotational basis. This proves tedious. What makes it tedious is that Blogger opens up this window with a link to their blog. Actually, often I can not even get a link to the blog. This is especially annoying when you would like to reciprocate the blog love you just received. Then, there are times that I get to these blogs, only to find out that they have since removed it, or they have not written a post in about three months. Still, much of the problem with not hitting everyone's blogs effectively lies in my inability to manage them.

So! I am open for suggestions on how to do this most effectively in Blogger. Any thoughts? Is there an effective way to make links to all the blogs that I read? I see blog menus at the top of some blogs that allow for the reader to easily click on a blog. This seems like it would take a computer science degree, or an especially large amount of time trying to figure out.

Bambini:

Wifey and I have the best children in the world. Now, don't get me wrong. Just the other day, I was having lunch with my friend Kelly and I asked her if she ever wants to put a muzzle over her children's mouths because they drive her to the brink of insanity. I think we both agree, that while we love our children unconditionally, that we sometimes wish that our houses came with round cushioned sound proof rooms.

However, while there is certainly a lot of insanity going around, they do manage to fill our lives with an unbelievable amount of joy and humor. Our children say the funniest things. For instance, yesterday morning, Stella looks over at wifey sitting at the kitchen table and says "Mommy.... daddy's triathlon stuff is all over the couch!" I came home from work last week and Julian came running to the door telling me that he had a special performance that he and his sisters were going to perform for me and mommy that evening. The kiddies have two parents that are artists. They recently attended a concert that wifey and I were in in which I made a bunch of my own instruments and improvised on several instruments throughout the performance. Julian had decided that he was going to spend the day building his own set of musical instruments before I arrived home from work that evening. Check out a small part of the performance:

Bonking:

I had a really rough run on Saturday morning. I went out for my usual 10k, but completely bonked at mile four. Like, as in, my heart rate was stratospheric. I think it was the result of: 1) Not being adequately hydrated. Imagine that. Me. Not adequately hydrated. The guy that went to the hospital twice—one of those times being personally chauffeured by my local volunteer ambulance service—over the span of five years. 2) Not enough rest. Yeah, not only had I not gone to bed early enough all last week, but I wake up far too early on account of our kids deciding that they want to make as much noise as humanly possible during the wee small hours of the morning.

THE FRIDAY TOP FIVE:

The Friday Top Five: The Top Five Things That My Children's Generation Will Never Know:

I think every generation probably looks at the next and thinks how fortunate they are to never have the opportunity to be able to do things that they were able to experience. Those pioneer work ethic folks that grew up before the turn of the century probably felt bad for their children who would never know how to churn butter, live without indoor plumbing, and never experience the natural glow of gas lamps. Having grown up during the 1970's and 1980's, I am really a gen-exer. Thus, my list will represnt the poor taste and bias of a disillusioned generation having had to live through both bell-bottoms and Cyndi Lauper:

5) The Adult Magazine: Look, whether for better or worse, one of the rites of passage for a teenage boy was the shame and humiliation they had to suffer going into an adult bookstore to get a glimpse, or purchase an adult magazine. With the proliferation of pornography on the internet, it seems that those days no longer exist.

4) Vinyl: I was part of the last generation of teenagers going out to purchase albums. I always chose albums over tapes. My friends thought I was crazy, but there were two reasons for this:

1) Album art is pretty kick-ass. They either have to scale everything down to fit on a tape cover—or CD for that matter—or completely eliminate some of the material. That is lame. Album covers were sometimes provocative, humorous, or grotesque. Whatever the case, when I was a teenager, I would spend hours in a record store looking at the cover art of albums. It was my way of getting my artistic fix if I was unable to actually purchase the album, which was most often the case.

2) You could always tape the album as soon as you brought it home. I had this crazy idea that I could tape all my albums and when one of the tapes started wearing out, then I could just record it on another tape, thus, preserving the life of my album.

3) Arcades: Sure, arcades still exist, but not like they did back when I was growing up. Games were generally only a quarter to play. About ten years ago, a bunch of high-priced arcade/bars starting opening up in large, trendy metropolitan areas around the country selling "points" on cards depending on how much of your hard earned money you were willing to part with. Wifey and I went to one of these places. After putting just $5 on our card, we realized that was only good for, hmmm, two games. I remember going to the mall as a teenager with a couple of dollars. That was my afternoon. It was usually a combination of Joust, Dig Dug, and Galaga. I really had to pace myself with my two dollars, otherwise I would be watching other people play for the remainder of my afternoon. I would have to comb the mall visiting Spencer Gifts, looking at posters of Samantha Fox and nameless poster models in scantily clad clothing with my friends.

The games today are ridiculously sophisticated. When I was learning how to play Mario Kart a couple of years ago with my boys, I found the learning curve really steep. It moves fast. For the life of me, I can not understand how more people are not suffering from neurological disorders as a result of prolonged exposure to these psychedelic video game experiences.

Nowadays, kids can sit indoors, all day on their Wii's, Crackstations, or other video gaming devices. As if nerds were not isolated enough, now nerds sit on their couch all day eating crap and playing video games, because mom and dad do not want to bother being parents. Look, I am not defending video games at all, but at least when I was a kid, we would have to stand to play them. More, we actually interacted with other nerdy kids about the best way to defeat that bad dude on the fifth screen of Kung Fu Master.

There was recently an exhibit at the Strong Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, of on hundred old video games like Tron (my personal favorite), Pole Position, Bezerk, Defender, etc. The exhibit was so popular–especially with nerds that fall into my demographic–that they actually purchased the exhibit. Do you realize that we will be the first generation of octogenarians playing Madden?

2) Pay Phones/Phones with Cords: I will never forget the first time I realized that I had to actually bite the bullet and purchase a cellular phone. It was gigantic and had an antennae that I had to pull up. I actually remember rotary phones.

1) Rock and Roll: The only way my children will ever understand what rock and roll is will be my me playing it and talking to them about it. There are no rock bands anymore. Seriously. Can you name one? A rock band. You know... like The Rolling Stones, The Who, and Led Zeppelin. I had a conversation with one of my classes the other day about how we are still talking about Led Zeppelin forty years later. How many bands from their generation do you think will be current forty years from now? We will look back on Maroon Five and Dave Matthews as horrible sociological experiments. The idea of rock and roll being dead brings up an even more interesting question. How will we ever experience the work of The Who again?

In modern dance, there exists several repertory companies that keep the work of seminary figures in the modern dance world alive, such as Martha Graham, Alvin Ailey, Jose Limon, and Merce Cunningham. Are there going to be Rock and Roll repertory companies, or are we only going to know what theses bands sound like from video and audio performances?

Training:

Okay, we have some unbelievable, unseasonably warm weather here in western New York. The sun has been shining all weekend with temperatures approaching the 60's! In late November! Ah, global warming does have its perks. I start my official season training on Monday. Can not wait. Looking forward to getting the official ball rolling.

More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five: The Five Worst 80's Artists

2011-11-18T07:50:00.001-05:00

Remember the 1980's? I do. Skinny leather ties, John Hughes films (I was no-so-secretly in love with Molly Ringwald), leg warmers worn over jeans, Atari, and Garbage Pail Kids (wifey still has a huge mint collection of them in the basement). Those were among some of the coolest trends that transpired from an era that gave rise to the perm and copious amounts of Aqua Net hair spray. It was sometimes difficult to distinguish the faces of many of the girls in my high school because the feathered bangs and porcupine-like hairdos negated their faces.

To be fair, there were some cool things that emerged from the 1980's. The 1980's were the golden years of both New Wave and Hip Hop. Bands like New Order, Depeche Mode, Elvis Costello and Art of Noise (named after the famous Luigi Rusollo manifesto of 1913) meant that nerdy keyboard players who previously got no love from screaming coeds attending their concerts, were now nerdy keyboard players that still got no love from screaming coeds, but were at the cutting edge of popular culture. It was this decade that invited a whole generation of white middle class suburban kids to wear baggy pants and imitate the subversive underground hip hop culture that was emerging by adopting the gesticulations and jargon of artists like RUN DMC and LL Cool J. The 80's ushered a new dance style of movement referred to as breakdancing. With Breakin' II: Electric Boogaloo as my inspiration, I spent countless hours perfecting my moonwalk and windmill. I am proud to say that I can still throw it down and in the same awkward way nearly thirty years later.

There was, however, some really terrible music that emerged during this era. Listed below are the top five songs that I am embarrassed to even say I know. If these artists were never to happen, I think the musical landscape of the 1980's would be a far better place:

#5) Mister Mister: Yeah, so take those broken wings and fly the heck out of here, because that song is wickety-wack. What made this band most possibly most embarrassing was the post-Bing Crosby-crooner-like lyricism that said "I am trying to be Steve Perry, but I am just not that cool." Interestingly enough, the band members all went on to have pretty decent careers in music afterwards, writing hit songs for artists like Madonna, Whitesnake, and Rod Stewart. However, lead guitarist and bassist, Richard Page, released a Christmas EP in 2010. Christmas albums are the official death of an artist's career.

#4) Night Ranger: This San Francisco based pop-rock band quintet's most popular radio hit was the power ballad "Sister Christian" which peaked at #5 in 1984. They are still doing it after all these years. Nice, old guys in leather pants. Move over Loverboy!

#3) Toad the Wet Sprocket: Years ahead of their time, I like to define them as the slightly less sophisticated Dave Matthews Band of their generation. You know, really Wonderbread. I am sure that the same things that made their music attractive to scores of soccer playing teenagers in the 80's are also what make Dave Matthews attractive to this generation of musically misinformed college coeds.

Oh, you Dave Matthews apologists, don't get me started. So many of my students ask, "Yeah, but they are such talented musicians, right?" They might be, but Yngwie Malmsteen has great facility on the guitar, but he is still embarrassing. I am not going to front. I own a CD though.

#2) Richard Marx: Did you know that his debut album yielded four hit singles and went on to sell four million copies? Don't even pretend like you did not rock it out in your mom's minivan to "Don't Mean Nothing," and I am quite confident his "Hold on to the Nights"track made it onto that mix tape you made the girl you were going to spend the rest of your life with in ninth grade. His second album, Repeat Offender, knocked Prince off of the number one position. Prince! Who is cool and can play his proverbial ass off! Repeat Offender went triple platinum in a number of months and eventually went on to sell five million albums. Blame it on the emergence of Gangsta' rap, but unfortunately Rick never attained the same level of success he enjoyed with his first two albums. In 2006, he appeared on the Fox television show "Celebrity Duets." Although the Fox network is known for its quality programming like Who Want to Marry a Multi-Millionaire, appearing on a Fox reality television show is kind of like making a Christmas album—the kiss of death.

#1) Rick Astley: Rick Astley falls into the category of artists whose songs all sound the same. Among the artists belonging to the dedicated club of making all of their music sound the same are ZZ Top, Dave Matthews Band, and Howard Jones. The best thing that Rick Astley has contributed to popular culture is the "Rick-Rolling" phenomenon. He defines the quintessential white man dance.

Who are your bottom five?

TRAINING:

We have all been there as athletes. You know, those times during the year when you are trying to compress the six million things that you want to do into a 24-hour period. What is up with this rotation of the earth being so quick? I have to admit though, now that we have been dealing with 24-hour days our whole life, it makes the idea of even having a slightly longer day confusing, and possibly, downright problematic. I mean. have you considered how perfect our clocks look with five numbers nestled on either side of those hemispheres between the twelve and the six? What would it look like to have even one more hour on that clock? Yeah, clearly not right.

My training the past couple of weeks have been pretty decent. The guilt of taking some downtime and continuing to eat as if I were still training for an iron distance event has caught up to me. To be honest, I clearly have to start training my proverbial ass off again, because I am not about to give up my 3500 calorie pancake breakfast with real New York State male syrup anytime soon. I have started to Rev my engines once again and start thinking about next season. My work-induced "downtime" during the month of October has officially left me hungry for more pool time and long runs.

It is shaping up to be a beautiful weekend here in western New York. I might get out for my last November ride of the season this weekend. Almost all the way through November and still no snow!

More soon. Train Smart!

Pardon The Interruption....

2011-10-29T16:39:00.001-04:00

Yeah, so, I am not even going to "front" (as those of who are truly in touch with our hip hop sensibilities like to say). I have been absent. I will spare you the details, but let me just say this:

We've moved.

Have you ever moved?

Have you ever moved with children?

Moving with the bambini was like trying to herd cats.

The picture above is is a view from our deck looking out at the lake in the morning. I get to roll out of bed every morning to this spectacular view. Talk about motivation! It is just there, calling me down. If we did not have winter here eight months out of the year, why would I ever do laps at the pool? This "waterfront"—although the actual waterfront is a wee bit father than it looks—is nothing new for us. Heck when we moved into our first house eleven years ago we had a teeny, tiny retaining pond in our backyard for the the development behind us. Eleven years later

We moved twice in the span of a month. Who does that, or more importantly, why did we do this?

Well, as we were waiting to close on our new house, and start the kids at their new school, we thought it would be a good idea not to live in our van down by the river, er, or lake in this case. It really came down to wifey and me not wanting to start the kiddies in there previous school and have to move them after a month. I know it seems crazy to some, but we thought it might have been a bit more difficult, especially given the fact that our twins were starting full-day kindergarten. The amazing thing about our children is that they just rolled with everything. Perhaps it is the fact that they are so close in age, but they were barely phased by the chaos the last month. When we moved into the house we rented from one of my colleagues, the kids were outside riding their bikes around the block, immediately making new friends.

Needless to say, the month following Rev3 has been absolosmurfly insane. Thus, I am just getting into the swing of training again. My new neighborhood provides the perfect triathlon training ground as far as I am concerned. I have a brutal 4.5, 7, and 9 mile loop that have me running up hills that I literally have to pump myself up for minutes before arriving. I can not make any excuses for taking a little time off, other than the fact that I have been a bit physically and mentally spent from the pace at work. Of course, if I don't train, I get a little lethargic and am not as efficient at work as I should be. When I swim during the afternoons and head back to my office, I am incredibly productive.

Speaking of swimming, the women's swim team invited me to start practicing with them, which of course, I graciously accepted. I think they all secretly enjoy kicking my ass, but you would never know it. They are incredibly encouraging all the time. Why don't I work out with them men's team? We don't have one. Needless to say, I am currently the slowest "honorary member" on the team.

I am still "unpacking" from Rev 3 Cedar Point and looking forward to another season under the fearless leadership of Mama Bear herself, Carole Sharpless. My nephew, Nicholas seeded me this video in a torrent file a couple of weeks ago.

Our fearless team leader, Carole Sharples interview 1/2. You'll understand after seeing this double feature, why Carole is well-suited to lead a team with so many personalities—she has multiple personalities herself:

I have some other big news for 2012 coming soon. Stay tuned!

Rev 3 Race Report

2011-09-20T15:14:00.000-04:00

Well, I had to sit down and finally write this report. I am not sure if this will be a race report or an online therapy session for me. I am still psychologically recovering form my race. I think this one is really going to take a while because I thought I was on the verge of doing something spectacular for me. A lot of friends have supported me this week by telling me "we've all been there." Unfortunately, this does not really make it any better.

Really, this is the tale of two races for me: the one until mile 10 of the marathon, and the one after mile 10 of the marathon.

I taught Friday morning. My nephew, Nicholas (who was incredibly supportive the whole weekend even as he was making his documentary film about my whole experience) came to my class Friday morning. My class ended at 11:05 and we made our way downtown to eat some breakfast before departing for the weekend.

I stayed pretty relaxed the car ride to Sandusky, Ohio—the site for the Rev3 Full race. It is about a five and a half hour car ride. The only thing that was troublesome for me about the trip is that my nephew packed the back of his Subaru Forester like he was going on an excursion across the Americas for a undetermined amount of time. He packed several cameras, a tripod, clothes for every conceivable natural disaster, and enough homemade chocolate chip cookies to make the Keebler elves envious. The ironic part is that Nicholas also has the family "vain gene" which necessitated him a black tank top most of the time. My bike was also IN the car with us, so I could not really put my set back to ever stretch out my legs. Being 6'2" has some slight disadvantages.

I ate great all weekend. By great I mean a lot of carbohydrates a lot of the time. It was as if I had died and gone to Italian Culinary Heaven. Friday night, a bunch of Trakker teammates and friends got together for some good food and conversation. I was feeling pretty relaxed. Nicholas and I got to our hotel around 9:30, put on my Recovery Pump, and decided to call it a night.

Saturday morning, a bunch of Trakkers teammates went out to the shores of Lake Erie (and do I mean erie!) to spray athletes down with "Magic in a Bottle," otherwise known as TriSlide. I had strict instructions from Coach Mary to stay off of my feet as much as possible. Luckily, my awesome teammate Kelly was there to make sure that I was diligent about this.

The Race:

Transition:

Unknowingly, this is where everything started to go completely wrong.

I felt really relaxed. I filled up my aero bottle, pumped my race tires. I headed out to the beach with Kelly's husband, Kelly. Here we are getting ready to head out on the beach race morning. Yup, those are the pants I wore. I was warm, and I match. What can I say. MC Hammer would approve. The only thing that completely messed me up was that when I got out to the actual beach near the start, I had suddenly realized—with less than twenty minutes before the actual start—that I forgot to take all the nutrition out of my backpack and into my swim to bike bag. Not good. Needless to say, I got the nutrition in the bag. Let's just leave it at that. I am confident that there were several USAT rule violations happening that magically made my nutrition appear in my bag at transition. I put on my wetsuit and got into the water for a little swim. This is a picture of the view the entire swim:

I am not exaggerating a little bit. I could literally not see an inch in front of my eyes. Perhaps this was the reason that my heart rate spiked and I thought I might drown on the way out to the first buoy. Or, perhaps I was completely psyching myself out. I have never swam a more physical swim than this. All the way out to the first buoy, I was being hammered, pulled, dragged, kneed, slapped, and moved. Of course, I would be lying if I did not admit to moving a few bodies aside to get to where I needed to go.

Once I got past the first buoy, it was clear sailing. I got into a rhythm and felt pretty good... I even kicked a little. A little.

My swim time last year was 1:24:57. I definitely had a better swim.

My bike time improved as well. Last year my course average was 19.16, and I biked a 19.26 this year. I even biked a faster split despite the fact that I stopped during special needs to grab two water bottle—something that I did not do last year. The bike was fine, except for the fact that about 40 miles in I suffered some unbearable pain that I had not experienced biking all season. REALLY?! Does this have to happen NOW? The pain was shooting from what I believe is my IT band straight down to the right side of my right knee. I do not know that I would have necessarily biked any faster (although I would like to think I could have), but being free from the pain would have made the next seventy miles of the bike a heck of a lot more enjoyable.

I did make a critical error on the bike and that was that I started drinking Gatorade more than I usually do. Even as it was going down, it is a lot more sugary than my First Endurance. I am not use to it. I had brought two bottles of EFS on the bike with me and picked up another two bottles during Special Needs, but I dropped a bottle somewhere—who knows where it is now—on the bike and was without my last bottle of EFS for the last hour of the ride.

Okay, The End.

Dammit, there's more!

Yeah, so, again let me just state the obvious: I'm an idiot. I started out feeling really good on the run. I walked every aid station fueling up. I guess this is where I made my second mistake. I brought a bunch of EFS mix with me in my Fuel Belt that I did not end up drinking. The reason why escapes me. I guess I was feeling so good that I did not bother to do everything that I trained with that got me to this point. I was effectively changing my game plan midway through the run. I was maintaining 10:00 minute miles throughout the run until I got to mile 10. All of a sudden, I started feeling reall, REALLY nauseous. I was not dizzy, I just felt like I was going to hurl. I looked down on my Garmin and I was at mile 10 somewhere around 1:35. I knew right there that it was going to take hurling, or a miracle to start feeling better. I was optimistic that I would feel better soon. Unfortunately, my optimism did not last long. I got to mile 13 and had to sit down. My body was dehydrated and exhausted. Wonderful! I knew my "race" was over. Then it happened. I started puking between mile 14 and 15 of the run. I thought I would feel better immediately. Not the case. Around mile 18, I sat underneath a tree to get some rest and contemplate the meaning of life. In about 20 seconds, I was surrounded by volunteers and medical staff asking me if I was alright. They took my vitals and said my blood pressure was running a bit low (100/60) and my oxygen was about 88%. I figured that had to be about right since my muscles were probably using every bit of it. They offered to take me to the hospital or to the finish line. I knew one thing. I might not have the race I intended on having, but there was NO WAY I was NOT getting a FINISHER T-SHIRT!

From that point on, I knew that this race was all about the t-shirt. I can honestly say that I have never worked harder for a t-shirt in my entire life than I did at Rev3 Cedar Point Full on September 11, 2011! The good news? I DID get that awesome t-shirt. I am now a two-time Rev3 Full Finisher, and although I did not have the race I had anticipated, or that I know in my heart I still have in me, I learned a lot this season from my coach. She should definitely shoot me for not implementing the game plan come race day though. I had a great time amongst friends, teammates, and my wonderful nephew Nicholas who spent part of his vacation with his uncle Mark. I think that was the greatest part of the whole experience. Nicholas and I got to share some really special time together. He was so encouraging the whole time we spent together.

I am retiring from Iron distance racing for the foreseeable future. I have children to raise, and music and performances to work toward. I will continue to race with nothing more than a half-Rev3 in my future. I know this sounds sick, but I will miss the training. What's wrong with me?

Since the Ironman diet is still in full effect, I think I better get out there again and start swimming, biking, and running. I just did a swim with Musselman race director Jeff Henderson. We swam in Seneca Lake sans wetsuits on Sunday morning. Holy smokes, was that water cold! I swam fast.

Thanks to all of my Trakkers teammates and friends who encouraged me to cross that finish line... run, walk, or crawl!

Ground Control To Major Tom: Countdown to Rev 3 Cedar Point

2011-09-02T15:45:00.001-04:00

T-Minus 10 9 days and COUNTING.

I've realized a some things:

1) With ten days left to go, I should probably book my hotel for Rev3Full Cedar Point. I am NOT kidding. This is just how I have to roll. I know... I know... how long does it take to book a hotel room? Look guys, I have FIVE kids. I might be sleeping in a tent outside on the beach before the race. The good news? The walk to the swim start will not be far.

2) I am nervous— way more nervous than I was before my first attempt at this distance. Why is that? I think it is a combination of having some sort of expectation of how I should do now after having one iron distance race under my belt, and being scared to death of how much pain I will be in at mile 15 of the run.

3) There is no substitute for sleep.

4) I have little time for sleep between now and Rev3

5) I will sleep when I'm dead. It's overrated anyway.

6) I have got the best job on the planet. Really. I came in to work the other day with this name plate on my door.

7) Blog posts tend to get less long and less funny the closer it gets to Rev3 Full Cedar Point. Some inverse relationship thing. I am not a mathematician. I don't know.

8) There are only 10 kinds of people in the world. Those that understand binary, and those who do not.

9) I received a new t-shirt in the mail the other day. None of my friends really understood it. Even those who have raced the distance. Do they teach periodic tables in school anymore? Is it just me or is my head a little fuzzy? Must be taper week.

10) David Bowie, although very cool, androdgynous, and quite svelte in leather, has absolutely nothing to do with this blog post.

Oh, one last thing.... my CRAZY friend Alexa just wrote a HYSTERICAL post about our Iron distance showdown here. I have some serious reservations concerning some of the rhetoric in her post though. Allow me to unpack a little:

#1) Alexa claims that as a full-time professor I have my summers off. That could not be further from the truth. First of all, five kids does not allow you to ever have your summers off. In fact, going to work at the end of the summer is like going on vacation. Don't judge me, those of you with children know what I'm talking about.

#2) Alexa wrote a list of advantage/disadvantages to handicap our showdown. What was interesting is that she said because I am a man, I have an advantage. Her argument for this was that no matter how fast Chrissie Wellington is, she will never beat a male pro. I am not sure I buy this argument. No... no, in fact I know I do not buy this argument. First off, you can not compare elite, pro triathletes to a couple of age-groupers with real jobs and responsibilities outside the world of triathlon. Secondly, I think the REAL comparison should be AGE, which is completely ignored in Ms. Harding's post. Alexa is a at least a decade younger. Sure, you could point at kick-ass age-groupers in their 50's and 60's and say age does not matter, but it does. Not to mention, that most of them (old fast men and women) have been going faster for longer than either one of us.

#3) Alexa has got one thing right. We both can be loud, but if it were a competition, she has me beat by a long shot. We both have decent abs and we are not embarrassed to wear as little clothing as possible to let people know that we've suffered long, hard hours for our statuesque ancient Greek-like physiques.

#4) If I win, it will be the upset of the millennium. It would be like Frazier beating Ali, the Buffalo Bills winning at least one Superbowl against a superior opponent, or the coyote finally catching that ever-elusive Roadrunner. Whatever the case, I am going out there to kick-ass and have the time of my life, again!

Today is my anniversary, I am going to celebrate with wifey tonight. I've been together eleven years with my best friend. You are awesome wifey. Thanks for all of your support this year!

More from Rev3 soon!

Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five: Top Five Things I Love About Training For Rev3 Cedar Point Full

2011-08-21T16:30:00.002-04:00

Do you know why it's Sunday and I am posting the Friday Top Five today?! Because I am convinced my coach is trying to kill me. Honestly, I am not sure what I did to piss her off....

I think that working with a coach has has made one thing glaringly obvious this year: I had NO idea what the heck I was doing last year when I trained on my own. NOW, that is NOT to say that you can not train your proverbial ass off and race well. I really believe that for people with no time to set up workouts or, more importantly, asses the data from your workouts in any meaningful way, I would highly recommend going this route. The other problem with assessing your own data is that it is much too easy to lie to yourself about why you are not performing at a high level.

Without further adieu....

Top Five Things I Love About Training For Rev3 Cedar Point Full

5) PERSPECTIVE: Training for the Rev3 full provides perspective on what is really important. Training for the full distance is time-consuming. If I do not get my ass out of bed and up at five in the morning for a 6 hour ride, it CAN NOT happen. Why? Playing catch with my boys, building legos with the bambini, or coloring pictures with my girls pays more dividends down the road than beating my last Iron distance time by an hour. Not to mention that staying gainfully employed means making sure I don't substitute training for say, syllabus design.

4) COACH MARY: Seeing steady progress in my swim and run are exciting. Coach Mary is the ultimate jedi-f-ing-Master. I am not sure how I arrived at this level of fitness after not running for 8 WEEKS, but I am excited that I am not hurting anymore and running fairly solid. I learned a lot this season about training, pacing, nutrition (and Coach Mary learned something about my nutrition plan.... I call it the "Olivieri Small Panini Plan, or just O.S.P.P. for short). Don't worry, I'll explain my "untraditional" nutrition plan in a future post.

The progress has not been limited to the bike. I have done several hour swims in open water the last few weeks. I am swimming as fast this season sans wetsuit as I was swimming last year WITH my wetsuit. If that is not improvement....

After a few long rides in some rolling hills, I also appreciate how quickly my bike fitness improves. I went out for a ride on a course I have ridden a bunch of times. I was scheduled for an easy hour zone two ride the other day. Something about hitting hills makes going into that westerly New York wind a heck of a lot easier.

3) ELITISM: There is no substitute for that totally elitist, self-rightous feeling that comes after finishing an long run before seven or eight in the morning. I also enjoy casually mentioning the fact that I "just rode six hours today, now I am going to the pool with my family for the rest of the afternoon." Sure, snobbery is not attractive. If you want to truly come off as being an elitist, you have to be (or at least pretend) that you are totally aloof to the fact that you are acting like Thurston Howell.

No one looks better in spandex than a disproportionate
Barbie.

2) SPANDEX: Look, if I have to wear it to race, I better have the svelte, rippled physique of a seventeen year old Swedish downhill skier (even I am not sure how I arrived there with that one, but go with it). Sure, my wife makes fun of me because of my 80's aerobic attire, but if I need to wear spandex—and, boy do I ever—I might as well be in my best physical shape of the year.

1) FOOD: Consuming over 10,000 calories on any given day is both fun and annoys the heck out of many of my friends. It is only during Iron distance training that I can somehow justify eating half of a sheet pizza, drinking a gigantic chocolate milkshake, and having a bowl of ice cream for an evening snack.

RANDOM CRAZINESS:

Building over the past couple of weeks has been both EXciting and EXhausting. I can barely log my workouts for Coach Mary because as soon as I get home from a six hour ride, my kids ask me to go on a bike ride with them. I look at them suspiciously, but then I remember that they are way too young to lay on the sarcasm that thickly.

• Yesterday after my ride, Julian asks me "...when I get older, can I have your Kestrel so I can beat me you at Ironman.

I said, "Julian, what makes you think you are going to beat me at Ironman?" He replied, "Dad, I am really fast, and you will be older."

• I remember when going out for a 10k, an hour bike, and a 1000 yard swim seemed like crazy long distances to have to traverse. I have an hour bike tomorrow and I am like "thank goodness!"

Okay, that's all for now. Looking forward to seeing all my Trakkers teammates and blogger buddies at REV3 Cedar Point in 20 DAYS!

Train Smart!

Ramping Up For Rev 3 And Watching Rugrats Run

2011-08-11T13:32:00.000-04:00

I had a really great build week last week thanks to the fine art of ~~torture~~ planning Coach Mary laid out for me. I had a great six hour ride on Saturday through some hills followed by a nice 30 minute run. All said and done, it was nearly 4800 feet of climbing. Now, I know it is not nearly as much as I would do if I lived, say, in Colorado, but it is pretty darn good for western New York.

I learned a couple of things around mile 90 of my 110 mile bike ride:

1) My sense of humor severely diminishes after mile 90.

2) I want "real people" food after 90 miles, like pizza, or a cheeseburger.

3) TriSlide is an essential part of any 6 hour bike ride.

4) My nutrition plan going into this year's REV3 Cedar Point is far better than I experienced last year. I will be consuming copious amount (at least a bottle per hour) of grape EFS.

Hopefully this will all pay off with a FUN day at REV3 Cedar Point. I am really starting to look forward to the race, despite all the craziness of trying to prepare classes for the fall semester.

I had a swim a one hour swim the other day—with another one scheduled here shortly—that I completely rocked. I mean, check it out.... my top speed was 121 mph. Take THAT Michael Phelps! Not to mention, I did over 2600 feet of climbing on my swim. That is surely unprecedented. When forced to explain how this is even possible to wifey, I told her that I would start underneath the horizon and continually swim back into shore. A canoe would bring me back out and I would repeat. Wifey rolled her eyes and said something about being an idiot. I am not sure. I really was not listening.

Last Thursday wifey and I took the bambini out for a "fun run" that is sponsored by one of the local running clubs. They offered for events for the kiddies: the 100 meter, quarter mile, half mile, and mile. Everyone wanted to try running. Below is a picture of my girls just before the race and a picture of Stella showing of her race bib.

The "race" organizers had all the events back to back. The kids maybe got three to five minutes between races to rest and enjoy their delicious popsicles. Our one daughter, Janina, ran all of the races. She won 100 meter and did pretty well in the quarter—considering she is just five years old. She must have her mother's genetics. Everyone did awesome and had such a blast. Luca surprised wifey and I by going out super fast in the 800. We thought he was going to throw up, but he managed to stride out the middle 200 yards and sail easily past the finish line relatively upright. Tonight, he is going to attempt to run the mile. Luca is as competitive as his old man. He gets distraught when I beat him at chess. He said he wants to come in first. I reminded him that these runs are not timed—they are just about going out and having fun running—to which he replied, "...yeah, I know, but I want to win the fun run." I was proud and tearful for a moment.
The first video is of the 100 meter. This was hysterical. You can see my daughter in the right hand corner in purple pass quickly past the camera, but watching Stella run is absolutely wonderful.

Heading out this weekend for another six hour ride and 30 minute run. I would like to thank Recovery Pump for ensuring that I am still able to run, let alone walk, on Sunday!

More soon. Train Smart!

A Triathlete's Manifesto: CAN!

2011-08-03T13:26:00.001-04:00

"To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift." - Steve Prefontaine

Fight Cancer

Beat Cancer

Last One Picked In Gym Class

To Let My Children Know That Anything Is Possible

The T-Shirt

Challenge Myself

There are thousands of athletes that train for triathlons every year. Everyone has something that motivates them. I have heard every reason why people dedicate so much time to go out there on a weekend, spend your heard earned dough, and beat the hell out of yourself for a few hours.

Lately, I have been getting a lot of questions asked by people—especially family—why I do what I do.

Do I have something to prove? Nope. I ran Rev3 Full last year. I know I am capable of doing the mileage.

So, why the hell do I subject myself to a part-time job that I will never get paid for?

Those of us who do it, understand why. It is not really a choice.

It is a lifestyle.

Like the "choice" to become a composer. It was not really a choice. I had an involuntary urge to want to be accompanied by music all the time. It was not that I "chose" to be a composer, but rather, it chose me. I can never stop thinking about music—it is in my head all the time. I write daily, I play daily. I write music because it is my passion and I have to do it. Whatever it is I do, I want to do it an an exceptionally high level. I think that is one thing I have noticed about triathletes. I have not met too many athletes who race triathlon that are complete slackers outside of that world. Everyone I know are incredibly hard-working human beings who work hard in every aspect of their lives—whether it is parenting, their careers, scholarship, academics, or their athletic endeavors. I have noticed that triathlon does have a tendency to attract people who are incredibly goal-oriented. That is a good thing, right? Even when I was tending bar in college, I asked myself "what can I do to maximize my tips?" No, Kelly, I did not take off my shirt. Despite what you think, I have worn a shirt more this summer than I have been without one.

There are few things I dislike more than people who say things like "...I just don't have the time," "...we can't do that. It's not possible."

I have never understood—nor will I ever—understand the notion that something is not possible. How is THAT possible?!

I have worked with people who have given me this line. I would rather work with people who try to find ways to do the seemingly impossible rather than resign themselves to some imaginary notion that they can not do something.

I see people overcome enormous obstacles everyday. Forget about triathlon. I look at heroic people—ordinary people—with live with physical disabilities, chronic pain, even terminal illnesses—who do not resign themselves to limitations imposed upon them by the words of others, or by their own bodies. Those who live with these "limitations" somehow muster up the courage to summon superhuman will—not allowing their brain to listen when the body says "quit, now," "you're tired," "you can't do this." These people are fighters. They are winners. They are inspiration for me. I think of the story of Dick and Rick Hoyt. If you don't know their story yet, I dare you to watch this video without getting choked up.

Why do I train? For me, I get little satisfaction out of the physicality of the sport. I mean, I don't wake up in the morning and say "Alright! I am super-psyched about my one hour open water swim and 45-minute training run today!" Okay, I do like to be out there hitting it hard, and I do love the feeling that I have after accomplishing a ride/run/swim, but to me, the more attractive part of triathlon is the mental component. Anyone who puts in the time to train can run a successful triathlon at any distance. By "successful" here, I mean that they can finish. Qualifying for Kona is not an option unless you are genetically predisposed, work your ass off, and, alas, MAKE TIME!

When friends say they don't have time to a man with five children, a full-time job, and a ton of projects constantly on the burner, I feel like I should have a free pass to just punch them in the face. For the record, my wife feels this way too. However, I am not a violent man, and the passive-aggresive route is so transparent to anyone with a brain. But, I do ask, "Is it that you don't have time, or you are just not interested in making time for that?" I have friends that are casual runners. Some even will run the occasional half marathon. One of my friends gets out to run two days a week—once during the week, and one "long" run on the weekend. I always wonder (aloud), why don't you do more running during the week?

"I don't have the time to train."

Let me translate what that really means: I am NOT motivated/interested in improving my run. I am okay with being mediocre. There are other things in my life that are more important to me.

OKAY—I get that! But, don't say you do not have time to train. I have gone for runs this season at 5:30 in the morning and 11 p.m. at night. I fit it where I can. I also do not run merely to train. I run for my sanity. If I don't run, I become a very irritable person. I need it to help clear the cobwebs, and to escape from the sometimes harsh and brutal realities of la vie quotidienne.

So, back to the mental part. That is the most difficult. Finding the will. You know, there are days that I just DO NOT want to go outside, I do not want to do it. This has been especially true the last couple of weeks in western New York as temperatures have consistently been in the low-90's, and the humidity can only be described as "brutal." I feel for my blogger buddies like Jeff and Anne who remind me that they live in that weather eleven and a half months out of the year. In the end, I know that if I don't go outside and start training that I am going to feel worse for it later. I am going to be grumpy, tired, lethargic, and filled with guilt (I getter over the guilt thing pretty quickly though, I must say).

TRAINING: I am currently in the middle of a build week. Everything has been going pretty well. I am biking and swimming where I think I should be. My runs have seemed a bit flat this week, but it could be because of the unbelievably oppressive heat and humidity (I'm blushing Jeff). The asphalt was well over a hundred degrees on my 45 minute run the other day. When I was done, it felt like I ran through a sprinkler.

I have a monster 6-hour ride this weekend. Yikes. I am going to try to hit a very hilly course. I will probably post the course here when I am done. If I am still alive.

More soon. Train Smart!

Aqua Mussel Race Report

2011-07-24T10:37:00.000-04:00

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY. TO ME! Yes, tomorrow shall mark the anniversary of my very first blog post. Two years ago I did my first HIM at the Musselman Triathlon in beautiful Geneva, NY. Musselman will always be near and dear to me since it was my first HIM. The good news is I have definitely gotten faster since that first HIM just two short years ago. Musselman is a really unique race. The race director, Jeff Henderson puts together a fabulous eco and family-friendly race that was voted one of the top five family races in the country for four consecutive years by Triathlete Magazine. Jeff has a great sense of humor too. Last year, Jeff established the micromussel, a race consisting of a 100 yard (or so) swim, .6 mile (roughly) bike, and a .02 mile (give or take) run. The athletes must either ride a tricycle or bigwheel for the ride portion of the microMussel.

My weekend was pretty crazy. You know, par for the course. I arrived in Geneva Friday afternoon. Kelly and I stayed at an apartment of a colleague of mine—thanks Izzster! Kelly and I were scheduled to work the Tri Slide Pit at the MiniMussel Saturday morning—which we totally rocked. I can not even begin to tell you how many athletes approached us to ask us where we could pick up TriSlide the morning of the race. Later that afternoon, Kelly and I had to be at the Smith Opera House for a rehearsal. We both were involved in the third ArtsTriathlon following the athletes meeting. This year was especially awesome since Kelly and I had an opportunity to play a piece together. We had not performed together since we were both students at the Ithaca Conservatory more than twelve years ago. How is this even possible?!

Following the Tri-Slide pit on Saturday, Kelly and I made our way to breakfast at a local restaurant where we ate our weight in pancakes. I ran out of the restaurant (literally) where I just got to my rehearsal time with moments to spare. Following the concert, I picked up my packet at the pickup, and Kelly and I returned to the apartment for some much needed Recovery Pump therapy. As you will soon find out, my legs certainly needed it last Sunday.

The Race: My knee started feeling better a couple of weeks ago, and I told Coach Mary that my run endurance was pretty good, and that I might be able to try giving the HIM a shot. I promised her that I would alternate running and walking, and that my ego would certainly not get in the way. Coach Mary's response was "... uh-huh. Let's talk on Thursday."

I then spoke to a couple of my friends—Kelly and Alexa—who also convinced me that my ego would get the better of me, and that I should not try to run. It came down to Coach Mary, who said "...you have two choices. Do you want to run this HIM, or run at Rev3 Cedar Point?" I chose the latter.

My swim was about 37-ish minutes. I never really felt great, but I did not feel bad in the water either. I think that I did not have enough to eat race morning. I drank a lot of my First Endurance Grape, but I could only manage to throw down a bagel. I just could not stomach anything else. I wasn't nervous, just not hungry! The lack of nutrition in the morning turned out to be a critical mistake when I got to my bike. Gheez, you would think I would have this figured out by now! I was hoping to ride in the high 20's, maybe even average 21 m.p.h. for the course. I had done the course a few times averaging around that, and thought that since I did not have to run, I could just leave everything out on the bike.

When I got to my bike, I had a little extra motivation waiting for me as I pulled my bike off the rack:

Despite my motivational mantra, the first ten miles on the bike were not fun. My legs were just never with me. Last season, I was able to do a lot more rides where the hills are. Unfortunately, this season, I have not been able to get out and do those rolling hills. I think I felt it on Sunday. There is no substitute for putting in the miles and finding some hills to climb. I averaged just over 19 m.p.h. for the course. I am pretty disappointed with my bike, but I learned something from the experience though, and that is progress: force the food down, no matter what! It was blazing hot on Sunday. The temperatures soared to 94 degrees. My bike split was 2:56. I have some work to do, but I will get it done, or I will suffer like crazy come September.

Off for an hour and a half spin. More soon. Train Smart!

From Urban Dictionary under the "Triathlon Widow" heading:

A triathlete is any person who was once human, but has now transformed into something super-human, and can no longer hang out with other mere mortals. They must spend all their spare time swimming, biking, running, and shaving themselves in order to keep their new-found sport god status. During this time, they are technically still married, but their wife/husband considers them dead due to their lack of normal human function.
Note: The spouse is only considered a triathlon widow during the time the triathlete is wasting all their spare time spent training, racing, shaving, or thinking about their multi-sport addiction in general.

I'm a triathlon widow this weekend. My husband is gone from our family for 3 days to do an Iron Man race 5 states away. Yes, he had to pay to be in it, and no he does not win anything.

Dear Geneva Bicycle

2011-07-11T21:39:00.001-04:00

Once upon a time I went down to Geneva Bicycle Center in Geneva, New York to be fitted for my new Kestrel 4000. Little did I know then, that I was making a decision that would profoundly change my life. You see, I never knew how comfortable I could be on a bike—or rather—how uncomfortable I was on my previous bikes until I was fitted at GBC.

With that said, I have always maintained that I believe
there are only a few people in your life that you should keep happy pretty much all the time if possible:

1) Your spouse (although it is fun to push their buttons because after many years of marriage you have mastered what really irks them).

2) Your librarian. Look, I have an unbelievably fantastic relationship with my music librarian. I take him out to lunch, I buy him the occasional cup of coffee, I go to his photographic openings. Somehow, my fines—which have at times exceeded the amount that I have had in my bank account at any given time—have miraculously disappeared.

3) Your friendly neighborhood bike mechanic.

You see, unlike my spouse and doctor, my bike mechanic has the responsibility of not only making sure that my bike does not fall apart midway through a steep descent at speeds any husband and father of five children should not be attempting, but also to make sure that my fit is—and remains—comfortable throughout my season. What I soon learned about GBC is that not only do they want you to have a great bike fit when you are there, but they want you to come in and talk about how it is going and to make any necessary adjustments as you need them. The owner, Jim Hogan, and his staff are terrific and ready to work with you to make sure you are comfortable on the bike and also comfortable expressing what you need to in layman's terms. In short, an elite bike shop without the elitist attitude—which this athlete really digs.

The wizard of bike fitting, Chad down at
Geneva Bicycle Center has over 25 years
of experience fitting athletes.

THE KNEE: Right before I ran the Ragnar Relay in the Catskills with ten of my friends, I came down with some debilitating knee pain. It was just dreadful. I really debated whether or not I was even going to race Ragnar because I did not think my knee would handle it. As it turns out, the Ragnar experience was one of the best and worst athletic experiences I ever had. I mean, I was in a 15-passenger van with ten smelly, tired, hungry, delirious runners. It was so much fun. On the other hand, I agitated my knee so much during Ragnar that I was unable to run for another 8 weeks following the race. That seemed like forever.

When you sustain an injury, a couple of things happen. First, you sit around brooding over how you have been training since January for a race in September, asking yourself and anyone else who will listen how this could possibly happen to someone so good-natured human being. My coach had finally had enough of my whining and told me to go and see the doctor, which I did.

The first orthopedic I went to said that the pain that I was experiencing on the left side of my right patella was an overuse injury, and that it is just bursitis. He recommended that I remain off of it for a couple of weeks and try to see how it feels after that. Before I left the office he suggested that I could try a cortisone shot if the pain continued. It was right there that I lost all faith in this orthopedic and immediately started planning a visit to another doc.

The second orthopedic I went to was definitely more thorough. He asked me questions that I thought were relevant including whether I had ramped up my training recently, changed my training, etc. However, his diagnosis was the same: bursitis. Take some time off and see if it feels better in a few weeks.

So, Coach Mary had given me some pool running and a lot of biking to stay fit along with my usual swim workouts the last four or five weeks. Pool running is effective, but about as exciting as watching fireworks from your car parked on the side of the road from miles away. What is with those people? Plus, I get a little squeamish about all the seventy year old ladies partaking in aqua aerobics undressing me with their eyes as I run in the water with my bathing suit. Seriously ladies, I am a man with feelings, not a piece of meat.

A week after my second orthopedic appointment, I am on a little ride in the town of Geneva when I notice something a little amiss about my feet. My right foot feels a little off-center (i.e. I was not hitting squarely on my foot, but rather it felt as though the outside of my foot was bearing most of the weight). I also noticed that my body was overcompensating a little bit by turning my knee inward. This was creating a considerable amount of torque on my knee that I had never really noticed before. I immediately thought "I need to see Jim or Chad at Geneva Bike and tell them."

I did.

The Diagnosis: I told Jim that I think I figured out where my knee pain was coming from. He listened carefully and sort of nodded here and there. He said, "...let's get you upstairs and check it out." The owner, Jim Hogan, had me kneel down on a padded bench and checked my feet for something called varus—a term for the inward angulation of the distal segment of a bone or joint. Jim put me on the trainer and made a couple of adjustments based on my feedback to him. He then suggested that I put an insert in both of my bike shoes of four degrees. He said that this would help with the varus, and that we would start here and see if it felt better after a couple of weeks of biking. Jim cut the inserts and put them in my shoes.

The Result: Two and a half weeks later, the pain subsided completely. I noticed no more stress on my knee, or residual pain at night from my rides. What I felt was normal fatigue from riding a couple of hours. Three weeks out from the inserts, I decided I would have a go at running again. I had a pool run scheduled, but decided to go out and hit the proverbial pavement. I ran 3.5 miles with NO PAIN! Thank you Dr. Jim Hogan!

Saturday night, I went out for a night time run with my Ragnar teammates with headlamps for a 6.5 mile run. Again, no pain!!! I have to tell you that when I went on that first 3.5 mile run, I think I was literally smiling the whole time.

I went back to tell Dr. Jim of ~~my,~~ er, our success. I told him that it I thought it was unbelievable that I went to two orthopedics and that I did not start feeling better until I confided and sought counsel from my bike mechanics.
His colleague, Chad was smiling in the background. I asked him why he was smiling. His response was, "I'm laughing because we hear that quite a bit."

The moral of this little story is that when you have an injury, there is usually not one silver bullet, but a multitude of things that you need to cycle through and check off. I debated whether I sustained the injury from my breaststroke kick, from poor running form, from banging my knee on something and then going out for a run and not remembering that I had sustained an injury. I think that I only noticed my foot because I was hyper-conscious about my knee. Why I only noticed it that day is beyond me. I think it might have something to do with what my wife likes to refer to as Refrigerator blindness syndrome. This is a very common affliction for men of all ages, in fact, it seems as though my eldest boy has inherited this terrible condition of not being able to see an item in the refrigerator when you have to move another out of the way in order to see it. Many married men suffer from this serious condition. This should not be confused with I Have No Idea Where Anything In This House Is Because My Wife Moves Everything On Me Disease. This is a much more serious condition that affects many of your loved ones. For instance, if your child comes up to you and says "Daddy, may I have some letter cookies?" A man might say "...sure, let me get those for you." He may even know where to find the bowl to put the cookies in, as he more frequently utilizes bowls to address his basic survival instincts. The cookies are another matter entirely. He could search cabinet after cabinet, only to find out one screaming and cranky child later that the wife has put them in a tupperware bowl on the counter that you did not see (because you may also suffer from Refrigerator blindness syndrome). I digress. Back to the knee.

Jim, Geneva Bicycle staff, you have one satisfied, healthy athlete who thanks you for your patience and knowledge!

The Other Stuff: Life has been crazy. Wifey and I are looking to move from our current house so that I can be closer to work. I coached Luca's Little League team this summer—what great fun! and I am finishing a new commission and prepping a new class for the fall. Okay, enough silliness for now. To all my blogger buddies, I look forward to catching up this week on all of your blogs. Here is what else I have been doing:

Luca on his All-Star Team

When wifey asked Julian if he wanted to try fencing after his
Lego Robotics Camp, Julian asked "What is fencing?"
Wifey said, "...it's like sword fighting."
Julian look at her immediately and said, "YES!"

My Girls at the Corning Museum of Glass.
No. Nothing got broken. An act of God.

Amalia and daddy looking at some cool
art.

We stopped at Glen Falls State Park on the way home (by accident).
We drove by it and went "woah! Let's check that place out!!!

I think that our trip down to the Corning Museum of Glass and Glen Falls State Park will be one of the defining moments of our young family. We had such a wonderful time together. The kids were unbelievably engaged in the modern glass art exhibit, saying things like, "that looks like two surfers on a wave," and "that looks like a flower with a sun in it." I love it.

I have a 50 minute run scheduled for tomorrow—imagine that!

More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five

2011-06-18T08:14:00.001-04:00

The Top Five Things I've Learned After Falling Off My Bike Going Over 20 M.P.H.

5) You're a Long way up! : You don't really realize that you are atop a small pony on your saddle. Instead of legs that could carry a grown man down the side of the Grand Canyon, you are praying that your 23 cm tires can withstand that small pebble for a few more seconds on your way down a hill going 40 m.p.h. with nothing between you and your chiclets but five feet of air which you catapult through at a speed that can only be calculated by a high-tech NASA computer that has yet to be invented.

4) Road Rash Sucks: Holy Burning Flesh Batman! I remember getting road rash as a child, but never to quite the degree that I received from my fall this week. Road rash can only be described as feeling like your skin is on fire for several days. Showering was dreadful all week. In fact—as gross as this sounds—I managed to avoid showering for a couple days following the crash. The first time I did, I thought that I would have rather have been subjected to listening to Lady Gaga for 12 straight hours (minus the apparatus to keep my eyes open like that scene in a Clockwork Orange. That was just weird.)
The good news? I was coaching my son's LL team just hours after the crash. The wifey came up to me and said "... you are so macho" and gave me a little wink. I thought... "hell yes... hell yes, I'm macho." I then cranked some Justin Beiber on my stereo when I got home.

3) Get Back Out There Right Away: When I was playing Little League as a kid (I am now coaching my son's Little League team—that is a WHOLE other post!) I got hit by a pitch right in the ribs. I did not think I could breath for what seemed like hours. My father made me get right back out there the next game and stand in the box. I am glad he did. It took a little bit of time before I felt truly comfortable hitting or catching a line drive hit 60 feet away, but I eventually managed to conquer those fears. I got right back on my bike the very next day and rode... slowly.

4) It's Okay To Be Scared: I have been a tad tentative on my rides this past week. You know... when the wind blows I am thinking, "Oh dear Lord, please don't let me fall off and break something." Nothing really hampers your season like breaking something.

There should be signs like this one warning
unassuming cyclists of unmarked potholes!

5) It Will Happen Again: Look, I am no moron. I do not welcome death. No one does, but we all cheat it. Everyday. I am smart enough to realize that it is not a matter of "if" I am going to take another spill, but "when." The best I can do is minimize the amount of damage I do to my body by making sure that my bike gets regular service (it is a good thing to check those brake lines and pads occasionally), and realize that going 45 m.p.h. down a hill when you have five children is just not necessary. Honestly, 35 m.p.h. is fine. Every once in a while I think about how fast 40 m.p.h. is on a bike and think about falling at THAT speed. That scares the hell out of me. I am still a bit tentative after the big fall, but I am sure that I will lose some of those inhibitions soon enough. I have been a lot more careful about looking well ahead of me for debris and unmarked potholes all week. The blood has almost stopped seeping from my knee.

THE KNEE: I may have finally had a bit of a revelation about my knee. The thing about an injury is that you really have to determine how the pain started developing. Post to follow.

Train Smart!

Hitting The Pavement...Literally!

2011-06-12T12:36:00.000-04:00

It does not matter how careful any of us are. If you ride, sooner or later, you are going down. I have been really fortunate that in the five years I have spent riding road bikes, that I only went down twice. Both times were borderline catastrophic. The first time I went down was three years ago. I was getting my road bike out for the first ride of the season. I was psyched. I put on my tights, my new Louis Garneau fall jacket, and my helmet. I then put my shades on and was moving my bike out of our garage with one clip in when I hit my son's Razor scooter and was catapulted to the floor. In my attempt to make sure I did not scratch my brand new Trek Madone, I threw out my arm and dislocated my shoulder. On the way to the hospital in an ambulance, the EMT's asked me to describe my pain on a scale from 1 to 10. I felt like breaking out with my Spinal Tap reference and saying... "but my pain is an eleven." Then I remembered that anytime I complain about pain, my wife is there to modestly remind me that she birthed five children. So, after a couple of seconds of thought, I literally said to the EMT's "Well, the pain is not as bad as childbirth."

There was a moment of silence. Then, the woman in the ambulance said "Yeah, we're going to go ahead and give you something for the pain." They probably thought I was delusional. The other really funny thing I remember about that day was when they came to take my pulse inside my house. The woman taking my pulse said, "Wow, your heart rate is really low. Are you a runner?" I looked at my wife and said "...well, I run, I mean someti...." My wife interrupted "Yes! He runs... You run! My gosh Mark, how difficult a question is that?" Ah, wifey! I can see it now. Me on my deathbed slowly answering questions about if I ate my jell-o that day, to which my wife responds "My goodness, yes! You had your jell-o you old fool. Remember? You took your teeth out?"

Yesterday, I bit it hard. Real hard. I am here to tell you that I am lucky that I did not break a single bone, let alone die yesterday. I am not trying to sound overly-dramatic (although I have often been told that I have a real flair for Dynasty-like melodramatic stories.

I really can not say I know how it all went down, except for the fact that I went down. Hard. I was riding down a road that I am really familiar with. I was about five miles from my house. I had ridden on this road more times than I can count. I was on my Kestrel in the aero position and working a nice little steady clip back home... maybe 21, 22 m.p.h. All of a sudden, I was on the road sliding on my body. Within seconds there were a couple of cars pulled up beside me asking me if I were alright.

I sat there for a second and assessed the damage. It is amazing were your brain goes in stress. I looked down and said "Yup, I can move my legs, that's a good sign." All of a sudden I felt severe burns all over my body; my wrists, my knee, my elbow. I sat there in shock for a couple of seconds—maybe a minute. Oh, I completely shattered the glass on my second Garmin 310XT. The ironic part is that my HR monitor has been acting... "funny" and I just contacted Garmin. They are sending me a replacement 310XT. Of course, I will have to notify them that their watch probably withstood more impact than my wrist took. Miraculously, it still works!

I guess all things considered, my spill yesterday could have been much, much worse. I mean, I could have hit my head, or broke some bones. What the hell is going on with my season? First my knee, then this!

AND, I ripped my Trakkers kit. I am almost scared to ask, "Could it get any worse?" Don't answer this semi-rhetorical question.

Seriously, after emerging relatively unscathed by my impact with the pavement, I felt pretty badass, but I am no hurry to meet that fate again.

Friends, be careful out there! What I learned from yesterday is just because you have ridden a route a hundred times, that does not mean you can take a second off from focusing on everything ahead of you.

Be safe out there.

Rev3 Quassay Race Report

2011-06-10T08:33:00.037-04:00

Is driving 7 hours through three states to run an Olympic triathlon worth it?

It is if it is Rev3 Quassay.

I met up with my Trakkers teammate Kelly and her husband—whose name is also Kelly— about two hours outside of Quassay for lunch at a diner on the way there. Kelly, er, female Kelly and I both had the pumpkin pancakes.

The race day expo was pretty cool. The Covert's and I decided that we would go out for a ride after heading to the Rev3 store and meeting and saying hi to some of our Trakkers teammates. We went back to the parking lot to prep for a ride. It was there that I realized that I forgot to bring my bike shoes. HOW DO I FORGET TO BRING MY BIKE SHOES??!! The funny part about that—if you can call it funny—is that I have an extra pair of shoes that I normally keep in my trunk, but for some reason, they were not in there.

Exasperated, this father of five ran back to the All3Sports store—wearing jeans on an eighty+ degree day—at the Expo and purchased a new pair of Louis Garneau tri shoes. Only problem was I had to put cleats on these puppies and make sure they were comfortable. I spent a good half an hour at Geneve Bicycle with my homeslice Chad getting my cleats squared away on my shoes. I brought my shoes over to Dave and his crew from Elite Bicycles in Philadelphia—the gang working support for the race.

Race Morning: I use to never be able to sleep before a race. That has all changed. I can sleep pretty comfortably the night before a race. I sometimes wake up a few times during the night for fear that I might sleep through my alarm. I set my alarm for 4:30, and requested an automated wakeup call from the hotel desk. As it turns out, I did not even really need one. It seems that my neighbors on the other side of my head board, through the thin wall of the hotel decided to wake up and have plenty of loud sex at 3:00 a.m. They continued their sex marathon for about an hour and a half. Needless to say, it was very difficult to sleep through the "Oh my God's," and "Yes... yes... yeses.," not to mention the insistent creaking of the bed. You would have thought that they were filming a sequel to Boogie Nights in that room.

I got my gear, went downstairs and enjoyed my race morning breakfast of granola, a handful of gel blocks, and Lemon Lime First Endurance drink. I got a ride in with the Kelly's in the morning. We all seemed pretty relaxed and ready to rock and roll. I think what kept me pretty even keel is the fact that I knew my knee was going to be a nuisance and not allow me to really push it on the run. I was not thinking about running fast, but rather, trying to minimize the pain I knew was coming.

THE SWIM: I got in the water about fifteen minutes before the swim start and swam about half way to the first marker. I felt pretty comfortable. Although, the morning of the race was the first time I tried on my new TYR Hurricane wetsuit. The lake that I usually swim in—Canandaigua—is not even open for swimming until Memorial Day. I felt pretty good the whole swim. It took me a little bit to get in a groove, but by the first buoy, I felt comfortable and relaxed. I felt like I probably could have pushed the swim a bit. The one down side was that my knee was hurting and I could not even manage a small kick. Who needs to kick? Swim Time: 28:44:616

T1: I had a great spot in transition. Because I downgraded from the HIM to the Olympic, the transition queen ended up giving me a place right at the end of the bike racks in the middle aisle. NICE! I ended up having a longer transition than I would have wanted—about 2:00. I think I spent too much time trying to get on my socks. I will go sockless the next race. (2:44)

THE BIKE: I absolutely love my bike. Have I mentioned this? I will say this about the Quassay course... it is hilly and challenging. My knee was a little sore from the start, and getting on the bike and pedaling did not help. I tried to put myself somewhere mentally to disconnect from the unpleasantness. I went out pretty conservatively—at least I thought so—which ended up being a mistake. I mean, in an Olympic distance triathlon, you pretty much have to put the pedal on the gas and go all out. I guess in the back of my head I was thinking, ".. hey, if you just don't go out real fast, maybe your knee will feel okay the entire race." FAIL. Bike split: 1:21:32/18.89 mph average.

T2: Yeah, did not even lace up my Avia's with speed laces. That was a mistake. It took me a little longer to tie my shoes, but I got out there. (2:07)

THE RUN: There first mile felt weird. The knee did not immediately hurt, so I was thankful for that, but it felt like I was still running on my bike clips. Transitioning to the run is always a weird feeling. Halfway through the first mile—mostly downhill—the knee started to hurt.... A LOT. My first 2 mile split I was running 7.46 min/miles, then I slowed way down to 9:19's the second half. This brought my run split for the 10k to 8:48. There was an enormous hill to climb at mile three. Between my knee and my run fitness suffering the last month, I could tell that I was not going to have the run I wanted. It was then that I immediately started thinking about cheeseburgers and cold beer.

POST RACE: Rev3 did an awesome job with the post-race goodies. There was a line to grab cheeseburger and hotdogs straight off the grill with all the fixins', macaroni, veggies, ice cream, drinks. I love watching some of these really fit women grab three cheeseburgers and pile up there plate and mow down everything.

My favorite part of the post race was sitting in the Recovery Pump tent. If I did not have to get up to go to the bathroom and had a beer in my hands, I think I would still be sitting in there. The pump was awesome. Here is a picture of teammate Kiersten enjoying some Recovery Pump therapy!

I made it to the pro meeting at 1:30, where Michael Lovato was MCing. The cool thing about Lovato is that he is a pro himself and he asked a lot of really good questions of the pros, as well as some that received more than a few chuckles from the audience. There, I ran into Magali Tisseyre. My boy EJ over at crankskins.com did a cool custom number on her frame. I managed to steal a picture with her. I wanted to steal a picture with Miranda Cafrae as well, but as you can imagine, when you are the reigning Ironman world champion, there is a long line, and I did not feel like I wanted to to make her pretend that she was my best friend for one more picture. Although, I did not mind doing it with Magali:

Saturday night after the race, I met my Trakkers teammates and their significant others for some good eats at this place called Carlito's. I was so hungry the evening after the race that I ordered a giant antipasti plate AND my own personal pizza!

Here is a picture from our dinner at Carlito's. Chad's son is crashed on the lap of his wife Janet. Long day for the little man.

A BIG congratulations to all my Trakkers teammates for a fantastic race. Kelly ended up getting third in Athena (Woohoo!), and everyone had a terrific race. Looking forward to seeing many of you again at Cedar Point in September.

More soon. Stay tuned.

Quassay Jitters

2011-06-01T09:39:00.000-04:00

Well, with Quassay just days away, I think it is officially time to start panicking. Do you ever feel prepared as you need to be? I am excited to head out to Quassay and get my first race of the season under my belt and meet all of my Trakkers teammates for the very first time. I am disappointed that, despite not running for nearly two weeks now, my knee continues to be a nuisance. So, I have decided to race the Olympic instead of the HIM. I think I could probably go out there and do the HIM, but I am worried about my knee the rest of the season. I still have some pain on the left side of my patella on my right knee. Since beginning training for triathlons four seasons ago, this is my first injury. I now completely empathize with people that have some sort of chronic injury that keeps them from performing at their optimum level. Jitters are good though. At the very least, you put yourself out there and race as a litmus test to how you may expect to perform the rest of the season. I feel pretty confident. The one thing I can say about Coach Mary is that she knew exactly what to throw my way... and at the right time. I have really improved my swimming this off-season. I have to constantly remind myself that four short seasons ago, I could not do a hundred yards straight! If I meet people who are in need of motivation, I tell them that. Then I tell them that in three seasons I did my first Iron distance swim. This usually inspires people, or they look at me and wonder if I have a few screws missing. Clearly, we know the answer to that one.

Look, I am not going to lie and tell you that I am wicked fast in the water. My official "T-time" at the beginning of my training was 1:50/100. I'd say it is about 1:45 right now. Although, I know I can swim 1:35/100 (or faster), because I catch myself doing it on occasion. The trick is how the hell do I maintain my form and not become exhausted 1000 yards in? Seriously... any help with this would be fantastic. I just wrote in my training log tonight and asked Coach Mary if she could check out my swim here soon. I was suppose to swim for her way back in December, or January, but alas... life happened and I simply could not commit to a meeting. My hope is to continue to improve my stroke. I am swimming twice a week right now which does not feel like a lot, although when I am doing it, it feels like plenty! I am excited about the prospect of getting into the lake here soon. I usually swim in Canandaigua Lake—one of central New York's beautiful Finger Lakes. We have had an unusually cold and rainy spring this year. There is a triathlon next weekend on Keuka Lake. It is the first regional triathlon of the season. A lot of really great athletes come out and do this race to gauge where they are. I hope—for their sake—that the lake is not freezing. I have it on good counsel that Quassay is well south of central New York and that the swim will be awesome.

It seems like my bike fitness has improved during the offseason. The other thing I did was get on a new ride this season. My new Kestrel, along with my bike fit from Chad down at Geneva Bicycle Center has made an unbelievable difference. In fact, I had no idea just how uncomfortable I was on my last bike until I was completely dialed in on this ride. What a difference. The screenshot on the left is from a Zone 2 ride on Monday. I prefer biking with the wind. Why can't we just do that in triathlon? You know... just bike one way to T2, run to a finish, and take everyone back to the start with a kegerator on the back of a bus. Wait... what a brilliant idea! "When I'm Race Director....."

Speaking of biking, that is the one thing that has gone completely right the last couple of weeks. I have been really good about getting out there and completing my rides. Last night, I did something that I have never done before. I went out for a little night ride. I put a running light around my waist, and I clipped two flashing red lights—one in front, and one behind me—on my kit before going out. It was a little nerve-racking at first. I quickly learned where to ride in my town that had good street light. I went out around 9:30 to ride for an hour. About a half hour into my ride, I see someone riding towards me with what can only be described as a light as bright as the sun. Okay, excuse the obvious hyperbole, but this light was so bright that I thought it was a motorcycle. All of a sudden, I see someone pass me on a mountain bike. Lo and behold, it's EJ from Team Crankskins. He was kind enough to ride with me a while providing his "sun-like" radiance for me to motor in for a bit.

I completely tanked two swims last week. I was tired and dehydrated. It is a sad state when you feel like you were swimming better at the beginning of your training than you are five months into it. I think I have a little bit of post-semester funkiness on me right now. You see, after my semester was over and I pulled two evenings of all-nighters to get grades in, I clearly thought that I was ready to start my professional triathlon career full force. I am kidding of course, but I did think I would have a bit more free time. Not the case. Then, a couple of days later, out of the blue, I have a kick ass swim. I have discovered that hydration is still the key to a successful swim.

Alright, Quassay race report to come soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five

2011-05-20T09:59:00.000-04:00

Looks like I will be going for the Ragnar double bottle opener come October in Pennsylvania. Two Ragnar races in the same season. I am clearly psychotic, or I have a subconscious desire for self-flaggelation.

Before leaving for the Ragnar Relay, I was having some minor knee discomfort. Like, I could not run without pain in my right knee. The pain was really localized to an area on the left side of my right patella. Running Ragnar was painful. The first couple of miles were always painful, but then the pain subsided—or my knee just became relatively numb—and I managed to grimace through it. On the way back from Ragnar, I was really concerned that no amount of physical therapy, or beer, were going to be able to remedy the pain in my knee. I could not even lift my leg up off the seat I was sitting on. So, I scheduled an appointment with the orthopedic on Tuesday.

Good news. He took x-rays and said my knee looks really healthy. Apparently the pain is a result of bursitis. Therapy: no running for a bit, ice and Aleve.

Looks like the gang is getting back together to race Ragnar Relay Pennsylvania in October.

Rev 3 Quassay is only weeks away. I am a little concerned about the water temperature being really cold. It has been rainy and miserable throughout the whole northeast this spring. What gives? Last year, it was unusually warm during the month of May. I am very excited about meeting many of my Trakkers teammates for the first time. Plus, I think my nephews are going to be out there documenting again for me. If you missed the nephews the first time around, you'll want to check them out for sure. My nephew Nicholas is an electrical engineer, and Michael is a marketing guru, but when they are together, they can not pass kindergarten. Ah, brothers!

Real excited to put all my training together in a few weeks on my way towards Rev 3 Cedar Point where I will be racing the iron distance. I believe Coach Mary has me preparing really well and I have felt confident about all my training. I have noticed a pretty substantial difference in my workouts since my semester has ended. For me, training has more of psychological toll than physical. During the semester, my mind is occupied with the laundry list of things I need to get done, and it is sometimes difficult to just compartmentalize my workout. It has definitely gotten easier. I think the solution will always be getting my ass out of bed and training earlier. That way, I can focus on what I need to get done during the day, and not worry about how I am going to fit my workout in during the day. Am I the only one who feels this way?

Okay, onto the Friday Top Five. My five favorite 80's movies:

The Friday Top Five—80's Movies:

5) The Breakfast Club: The 1985 cult classic that immediately resonated with a vast majority of generation xers because of its ability to employ every possible high school stereotype: the jock, the head, athlete, the basket case, the brain, and the princess. Honestly, I think that everyone who is currently in the late thirties or early forties has had to seen this movie at least once, if not multiple times. The Breakfast Club is a story about five high school students who—represent every possible cliche their is—have to spend a Saturday afternoon at their high school for detention. I will be the first to admit that I had almost an unhealthy hidden love affair with the red-headed angel of all those classic John Hughes films, actress Molly Ringwald, for most of my adolescent years. For years I could watch this film and recite every line almost verbatim. I was so nerdy. Like most adolescents, I was trying desperately to find myself. I would break down my high school persona as such:

40% Anothony Michael Hall's character
40% Emilio Estevez's character
20% John Bender's character

Admittedly, every once in a while I will get on IMDB (Internet Movie Data Base—for those of you living n another galaxy ) to see what Molly and Ally are up to. Why, oh why can I not see more of my two high school girlfriends?

4) Real Geniuses: I have said it before and I'll say it again. Never has there ever been a finer film made about nerdy engineering students developing a high-powered laser that can liquidate human targets from outer space. I have probably seen this film more than any other film on my list. I watch it a couple of times a year and never tire of it. If any of you are looking at ways to blow up a house using a laser and popcorn, you should check out this movie.

3) Sixteen Candles: Another one of my John Hughes favorites. Sixteen Candles is the classic story of Samantha Baker—played by my high school girlfriend Molly Ringwald (unbeknownst to her)—in which her family completely forgets her sixteenth birthday as they are completely consumed by wedding preparations the same weekend for their oldest daughter. It is your classic "nerd likes girl, parents forget birthday, sister gets married and snookered up on muscle relaxers, girl falls for jockey sensitive, wealthy type whose father owns a Rolls Royce who Anthony Michael Hall's nerdy character—smitten for Ringwald—will use to have sex in with jock's ex-girlfriend story." But, there are some twists too. How can this movie possibly miss?

2) Caddyshack: There have been a lot of golf movies: The Legend of Baggar Vance, Tin Cup, Happy Gilmore, but for me, there will never be a better movie ever made about the sport than Caddyshack. I think the comedic timing of this movie makes it so funny. What's more, comedic legends Rodney Dangerfield, Chevy Chase, and Bill Murray star in the same film. I can not play a game of H-O-R-S-E with someone now without yelling "Noonan" as they are trying to sink a shot. Hysterically, my nine year old son—who has never seen the movie—will also yell out "noonan" as I am trying to sink a shot. I've created a monster.

1) This is Spinal Tap: I would seriously give this movie a 9 out of 11. If you do not know what I am talking about, then it is right time you get hip to the greatest rock film ever made. This is SPinal Tap takes a satirical and unbelievably accurate look at the heavy metal rock scene of the late 70's and early 80's. I have enough friends who lived this lifestyle who say that this hits a little too close to home. You know... spandex, completely self-absorbed personalities with unbelievably poor self-awareness. Everything that made heavy metal great.

Honorable Mentions: Back to the Future, E.T., Blues Brothers. What are YOURS??!!

Okay, more soon. Train Smart!

Ragnar Relay Race Report And Coming Out Witness Protection

2011-05-16T10:35:00.001-04:00

Running in my super cool Trakkers kit and wicked fast
Avia Quest Lite.

Gang!

I'm back!!

Really!!!

I know what you're thinking "...sure we've heard this all before. He builds us up with the anticipation of these stellar blog posts—complete with his self-proclaimed witty humor, and over the top sarcasm—and just toys with our poor emotions as we are left stranded wondering if he is going to end up on the back of a milk carton, or need to be relocated to Sioux City, Iowa for a crime he witnessed at a high-profile Italian eatery."

Nope, neither of those. I have just had the busiest year of my life. I had been commuting an hour to work five, sometimes six days a week all year. Twice a week, I did not get home until after 9 p.m., and there were times that I was enjoying my dinner at midnight! Okay, enough of this 'woe is me' me type rhetoric, now on for the good stuff.

About eight months ago I saw one of those advertisements on Facebook that runs along the sidebar that read something about Ragnar Relay. I never pay attention to adds, or so I thought, but on this particular occasion I decided I would check it out. And so I did. Ragnar Relay is a running race series that has teams of up to twelve members compete in a relay that runs for—in our case—197 beautiful miles of New York state. And so, I thought to myself, "197 miles in a van with eleven other runners who are going to be tired, cranky, stinky, and hungry by the end of the experience.... what could possibly go wrong?" Coincidentally, the phrase "what could possibly go wrong?" became my mantra throughout the Ragnar experience. You see, with five children, I have the attitude that you just have to roll with some things in life otherwise you are going to be confined to a straightjacket wondering where it all went wrong. It was right there while reading the Ragnar message and what the race entailed that I decided that this all seemed completely crazy, and was therefore obligated to try to run this thing with eleven of my soon-to-be closest friends (whether they liked it or not). The first thing I did was post a message on The Facebook to four hundred or so of my closest friends asking who was "in?" What I soon realized is that most well-adjusted people with careers, families, and household projects are not easily eager to commit to something this undeniably ~~stupid~~, er... ~~insane~~, er... ambitious? Needless to say, I got a couple of "hey, that sounds like a really cool thing. How far is it again?" messages. The usual suspects: Adam, Scott, and Manuel were way overextended with some other things to be able to commit to this race in early May. Then, I had a stroke of brilliance (yes, I am sometimes struck with the rare brilliant idea). I will ask my Trakkers teammate, Kelly C. and her husband to take part in this. Kelly did a 50 K earlier during the year.... she's crazy... she's likely to do this. Alas, Kelly at first said "yes" then regretfully had to decline because she had some boring wedding to attend... (just kidding Kelly). The first person who committed to doing the relay was the wifey. We have been looking into doing some unconventional races together for some time. More on that later. The next person who committed to doing with was my friend Sarah. Next was my friend Mike whom I work out with at my YMCA. Next came my friend Ryan, another young cat, who I know from the Y. Actually, I know almost half of the team because of my relationship with the YMCA. Below is a picture of the team complete with their official Ragnar nicknames, designated by team captain (me) based on my Ragnar experience with them.

From l to r: Danny "Talker" Vandonginator VanDongen, Terry "Pinky" Christo, Greg "Chef" Christo, Nicholas "Honey Badger" Grenses, "It's not Ryne, it's Ryan" Ryan "Camel" McClean, Mitch "Instigator" Mitchell, Mike "Squirrel" Texiera, Sharon "Sunshine" Mitchell, Me "Gimpy", Sarah "Stealth" Beyler, and Derek "Franchise" Lockhart

Oh, where is wifey? Yeah, it's been a bit since the last blog post, eh? Wifey decided that on one spring like afternoon she would get on my son Luca's Ripstick (kind of like a skateboard, but with only two wheels) without helmet or elbow pads. Needless to say, this did not end well. After a trip to the hospital, an MRI to look for a concussion and several stitches to close her grapefruit-sized swollen elbow, it was back to the house. As if it could not get any worse, a few days after removing her stiches, her bursar sack ruptured and fluid flew out of elbow in the manner of bad special effects in a B movie. Sadly, wifey will have to wait for the next one. I was REALLY disappointed. I wanted to share this experience with her.

Here is our ex-Pentacostal church van. I am NOT kidding!

I almost did not think the race was actually going to happen for my team. With less than two weeks left to go before the race, we did not have hotel reservations, transportation, any idea of who was going to run what legs, what to bring, etc. Yup, this is just how I roll. What I soon learned is that everyone was up to their eyeballs with work, and like me, this is a group that does not panic, but merely says "okay... how are we going to make this happen?" In one meeting over a few beers a week before the race, we hashed out everything and I ordered the perfect van from a place called "Clover's Clunkers." The official Ragnar race "bible" suggests that teams of 12 have two passenger vans. Their theory/recommendation/take, is that with two vans, you could have your first six runners run while the other six sleep/rest/play crazy eights, etc. Somehow, I had this sneaking suspicion that a relay race that traverses over 197 miles that will last roughly anywhere from 25-DNF hours is not likely to have a lot of of downtime. The other thing is that, it really does not matter if you try to sleep during the day (at least for me), when it's nighttime and you are use to going to sleep at say, eleven p.m., or midnight, your body wants to crash. I knew that it would not matter that I was well rested. This is just a really drawn out way to basically tell you I was too cheap to go with a second passenger van, but instead ordered one 15-passenger van for the trip. When we sat down for those beers, we (the six members of the team that could make it (Mike, Terry, Greg, Mitch, Nick, and me) projected a fairly realistic pace time of about 9 minute miles. If we did this, we would finish the race in just under 30 hours. Unfortunately, our seed times were all based on some pretty optimistic 10k times. The Ragnar committee gave us a 10:00 a.m. starting time. The only problem was that the finish was only open until 5 o'clock. If we miscalculated and actually ended up running slower, incurred an unexpected injury, or our wonderful $60 a day 15-passenger van decided to suddenly not perform up to expectations (running and breaking on steep hills), we might be facing a poor time, or worse, a DNF, or worse yet, death at the hands of a Ford Ecoliner.

We stayed the night in Liberty, New York, just down the road from the famous sight of the 1969 Woodstock concert. In fact, the start of the relay was actually at the historic concert sight! I thought this sign was hysterical. Nothing is allowed onto the sight that actually made this a great experience in the first place. Okay one to the race...

It would take a manuscript the length of the Harry Potter series (which I finished by the way) to tell you about everyones legs, and all the crazy and amazing things we saw along the way. Let's just say that my team surely rose to the occasion and ran their proverbial asses off with a total time of 25:03:46. Not bad, right? That is a team pace of 7:38 over 197 miles. The amazing thing is I actually think that had circumstances been a bit different, we may actually have run it slightly faster. Unfortunately, I was "nursing," "coping," "bearing as much pain as I could possibly withstand" throughout the race. (More on the knee later). So, taking one 15-passenger van meant being at the next exchange in time for the runner who was out there. Sometimes it was difficult. There were a couple of legs that were only 1.9 and 2.4 miles long. If you have someone running low 7:00 minute miles, you barely have time to drive to the next exchange, get your next runner out and cheer on the next exchange. We gobbled on stuff throughout the trip: peanut butter pretzels, banana muffins, a huge bag of granola (thanks to the large team of runners that stayed at the hotel with us who left it in conference room at breakfast time). We, uh... borrowed it.... forever. I had a peanut butter sandwich somewhere along the way, and a local fire house put together a spaghetti dinner or turkey wraps for dinner when we arrived at one of the exchanges at 7:30 on Friday. It cost $8.00 dollars. My cousin Danny and I had $12 dollars between us when we got to the exchange and some runner offered to make up the difference of the rest of our meal. Very cool. Whoever you were—thanks!

Our team had two Ragnar magazines that had detailed printouts of every leg of the race with their ratings: Easy/Moderate/Hard/ and Very Hard. Personally, I had one moderate, a hard, and then finished with a very hard run. It was a beautiful trail run. The first two miles were straight uphill. I almost went the wrong way when I set out to run my last leg. I got to a point in the trail that looked like a pool of mud and said.. "certainly I am not suppose to run through this." I was incorrect in my thinking. So, I ran back down and started to set off on a different trail when I heard my teammates yell, "No... Mark! You were going the right way!!" Oops.

The one thing that I would warn people of who are considering running Ragnar New York is that you should be prepared to run hills—a lot of them! It was as if the race director went out and said, "...hey, where are the biggest hills to punish these people?" Well, if pictures tell a thousand words, I guess I am in luck. I have been absent for a while, and I do not think words can really capture the essence of Ragnar race experience.

Here are some pictures from the race:

I called PETA shortly after taking this pic.

The legend continues.

I don't know why, but I just think of Bananrama, parachute pants,
Flashdance, and MC Hammer whenever I look at this picture.

This is one fast viking!

Don't ask, don't tell.

This takes guts... or underpants....

We would have faired pretty well in this category as well!

.. but well worth it!

Showing off her bootie for the camera, these runners
were rocking the 90's metal scene.

I love this picture! A well deserved rest.

This race has inspired me to want to try the Rev 3 Adventure Race Series next year. Okay, I hope I did some justice to this amazing race experience.

More soon! Train Smart!

Mendon Ponds 15k Race Report And The Friday Top Five

2011-04-04T13:06:00.001-04:00

Okay... I know what you're all thinking. Where the hell have I been?!

As some of my teammates still in college know, the end of the semester can be a real pinch. It is also an incredibly busy time for the professors. I mean, I have to think of a bunch of tedious, time-consuming assignments to make my student's lives hell. It's not easy. Trust me.

I ran the Mendon Ponds 15k yesterday. I was a little concerned about the race. The week before last, I only put in two days of training. I had a pretty decent swim on Monday and then started my bike workout Tuesday evening at 9:00 p.m. Yup, I was riding until 10:30 p.m. Lovely. That was apparently just enough to send my immune system into a tailspin. I did zero running that week. Zero. By Sunday, I felt a little better and put in a nice ten mile run with Coach Mary and a few of her athletes.

Mendon Ponds is hilly—really hilly. Luckily, I felt pretty decent. I was just so happy to be out there running with the sun shining that I barely noticed that I was putting in a pretty decent effort. I was happy with my 1:16:08 (8:10) pace. A ouple of times during the race I got a little lazy running down one of the big hills after working hard to get up that I allowed my foot to cross over and scrape my opposite ankle. It stung a little, but I really did not think anything of it until I looked down after the race and saw this:

Lovely, eh?

Who knew sneakers at high velocities could become a dangerous weapon?

Last night, I sat up writing this post and attempted to upload my Garmin data. Where are you Garmin data?! Ugh. I have to call Garmin today and figure out where it went and why my watch suddenly stopped communicating with my computer. Curse you technology!

I know I missed last week. I will try to catch up this week with the Friday Top Five.

The Friday Top Five: My Five Favorite Books

1. Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: This was a game changer for me on so many levels. I read this book again while finishing my dissertation and it reaffirmed the fact—for me—that I can argue a ham sandwich if I need to. I think this text should be passed out at birth for everyone to read before their eighteenth birthday. It discusses the classical/romantic divide, and subjectivity and objectivity in aesthetics. I feel so strongly that this is a book that everyone should read, that I have actually purchased copies of this text for friends and colleagues.

The book resonates for me on a different level as well. About a year before my father passed, I lent him my copy of the book and asked him if he would read it. My father and I never really talked about books, music, or aesthetics. He had very little understanding of my world, and I had even less of his. I am a composer and musician and my father was a tool maker. For years, we would have conversations about the sole common denominator between us: the New York Yankees.

My father read the book, and as he was reading it, we had some of the most beautiful conversations that I will cherish for the rest of my life.

2. Harold and the Purple Crayon: I read this book for the first time when I read it to my son Luca. Children are funny about books. They could read the same ones over and over and not get bored of them. Oddly, I never got tired of reading this book either. The book ends with Harold drawing his sheets over his bed (literally with his purple crayon), and then falling asleep.

3. Born to Run: Oddly enough, I am a huge fan of the Springsteen album released back in 1975 by the same name. For me, Born to Run was important in in validating the important fact that humans are made to move. The author—Christopher McDougall—goes to great lengths discussing the historical and physiological evidence to prove that human beings are indeed running animals. McDougall somehow manages to write a concise narrative addressing the commodity factor of running shoe sales, anthropological study of the run, and an ongoing narrative about the Tarahumara Indians of the Sierra Madre's in Mexico.

4. Morton Feldman Says: There have been a lot of important books relating to composers, the craft of composition, the discussion of aesthetics, form and process. I have read a lot of them. None of them were as profoundly important in shaping my philosophy of composition as this collection of interviews and essays with the American iconic composer, Morton Feldman. Perhaps some of his contemporaries—John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Pierre Boulez (to name a few) enjoyed more validation as composers in their lifetime, but I find Feldman's philosophy on music to be the most refreshing and post-modern. He freely admitted that there were times when he looked back after finishing a work that he had no idea how he created it. He could not speak about the large-scale form, or the collection of pitches and timbre he used from the instruments. He worked solely by intuition. The important thing I took away from this is that I do not have to always answer how or why I create my art—it just is.

5. The Little Engine that Could: A classic. There are still times when I am out there on a long run that I remember that book. It is a story told in many longer —and not as well-conceived narratives—about the power of the "human" spirit and the drive to continue in the face of insurmountable odds.

Training is going pretty well. Coach Mary said that my swim test time improved, although I am hardly buying it.

Okay, more soon. Train Smart!

"Winners are not those who never fail, but those who never quit."

Bustling, Bullfights, Beer And The Friday Top Five

2011-03-14T22:14:00.002-04:00

First, let me apologize to all of my animal loving friends and bullfighters for this frightful picture. It has absolutely nothing to do with this post. Well, almost nothing.

The past week has been pretty awesome as far as training goes. After my ~~marathon~~ interview last Thursday, I felt like I had the weight of the world off my shoulders.

I started up again on Saturday morning with mile repeats:

15 minute warmup followed by:

4x1 mile repeats with 3:00 minutes rest in between. I finished up in zone 2.
My repeats were a good minute slower than wereI ended at the end of last season (8:00, 7:54, 7:48, and 7:42). Of course, I had not started my mile repeats until later in the season, so I am hoping that will benefit me as well.

Sunday: 45 minute bike in zone 2-3 at 90 RPM

Monday: 3000 yards in the pool with a 1500 yard straight main set followed by a half hour of functional strength.

Tuesday: 45 minute tempo run/60 minute bike

Wednesday: Same swim as Monday. Felt more awesome today than Monday.

Thursday: Was SUPPOSE to do a 60 minute run, but my body completely rebelled. I ended up doing 20 minutes and shut it down. It just was not there. I think I know why my run suffered today. First, I did not have a great eating day. All I ate all day was some seven seed bread that I picked up in the morning before getting to my office. Not enough fuel. Secondly, I did not drink enough during the day... as in zero, zilch, nada. Why? Because I am an idiot. Yup.

Friday: Was SUPPOSE to do my Thursday bike. Got home late and put time in the bank instead. It will pay greater dividends in the end. Of course, Ironman does not care that I could not get to my mid-week bike.

Saturday: I ran the Johnny's Runnin' On The Green. This is the local St. Patty's week race in which you have everyone from kick-ass competitive runners to guys and gals dressed up in all sorts of leprechaun-esque accoutrement with shamrocks on their heads. Usually, they are taking a break from drinking Guinness at 10:30 in the morning to go for a five mile scamper through downtown Rochester. I had a whole bunch of college coeds pass me early on who I saw grabbing the sides of their stomachs and puking about a mile and a half into their run.

Here are the numbers:

38:53 (7:47 M)
AG: 35/105
Overall 358/1655
38:53 (7:47 M)

The race was okay, but I never really felt like I got in a good groove. I think I may have started out slightly too fast and just not got in a good running rhythm. I looked down on my watch after the first mile and saw that I was running 7:20's. I did not think I was going to be able to keep this pace up at this point in the season and I was right. I even tried slowing down so that I would be running an 8:00 M pace for a quarter mile, but it felt like I was walking.

Speaking of walking—what the hell is up with walker guy people passing me as I am running? There was this older cat ~~running~~, er walking like he was in the finals for Olympic speed-walking. How does walker guy pass me? Seriously. I was pissed. With about a quarter mile left I just said to myself "Oh no you didn't," and passed him.

Sunday: 1:15 trainer ride. (It was suppose to be 1:30). I did 60 minute in zone 2 and 15 minute in zone 3. Then I ate a pound of my wife's lasagna.

Today (Monday): I had a physical this morning. You know, that yearly thing you have to do. I learned two things:

1)My resting heart rate is 47

2) Apparently I have a healthy prostate. I know this, well... I think it does not need to be said. There is something SO wrong about that. At least buy me a couple of drinks first doc. Followed it up with a totally kick-ass swim workout:

6x100 F
100 K
200 Pull with paddles and buoy
10x25 HARD
8x25 K hard with fins
10x25 HARD
2x400 Pull
4x100 Kick with fins

I managed to get this done in 57:00 minutes. We all know I am not blazing fast in the water. However, I think I have seen some steady improvement despite the fact that I am only swimming twice a week right now. I am not sure if Coach Mary will ramp up the yards (I pray not), or add another swim workout during the week, but I am digging my workouts once they get under way.

The Friday Top Five: The five funniest things my kids said/did this week:

#5: Upon finishing the fourth Harry Potter book, Luca came downstairs and said "Mom, just so you know, I never want to go to boarding school."

#4: Julian, Luca, wifey and I were all playing the game Catch Phrase this weekend. Have you ever played Catch Phrase with a seven and nine year old? You pass around a round "clicker" that magnifies a word that you want your teammate to say. I dig playing it with the kids because it gets them to describe things using other words. They are usually pretty simple words or compound words like "astronaut," or "black eye," or "London." Sometimes wifey and I are really surprised at the the language they use. For instance. Julian gets his clue and says:

"Stella's favorite color is..." Wifey says "green." Then Julian says, "right, and we live in a...?" Wifey says "house." To which Julian replies "and put them together..." "Greenhouse!"

Love it!

Anyway, the teams were Luca and Dad against Mom and Julian. Julian begins by explaining a word, saying, "Okay... you and daddy drink this beer. It is like... a color and then a thing that you turn on" Wifey and I look at each other with puzzled looks on our face. What the hell is this kid talking about. Time expires and he give the clicker to wifey and says "Blue light! You know how you and daddy are always drinking that blue beer."

Okay, that is funny enough. First of all, we don't drink anything with the word 'lite' in front of it. I usually drink stout, or a porter, and wifey like a good hefe-weizen.

The best part was after going back to look at the word....

"Bull Fight" Wifey and I were rolling on the floor laughing.

He did not read it that carefully apparently.

#3: After coming home one day last week, Amalia came up to me and gave me a hug and a kiss and said "Ahhh... I'm in love!"

#2: Luca and I were sitting around the dinner table one night discussing Harry Potter when Stella says "Daddy, I read all the Harry Potter books too." "You did Stella? When did you read them?" Stella replies, "Well, not yet, but I am going to read them all when I am older. I will read them to my little sister." Stella is the youngest of five. I can assure you, there are no more on the way. Perhaps, ever.

#1: This is by FAR the funniest thing I think ANY of my children have ever said to me. I was building the Lego X-Wing Fighter with my son Julian. He was having a little trouble with part of the directions. So, I said "Julian, can I help you with that? I don't think you are putting that together properly." Julian looks at me and says "No, dad. What? Do you think you have a Ph.D. in Legos or something?"

Okay, March is upon us which means the NCAA tournament is almost underway. I shall be posting my official pics, as I feel it important to absolutely humiliate myself. Last year, my son Julian picked all the teams by the Mascots names and colors of their uniforms and had a much better bracket than me. He had Butler winning it all, and they almost did! My wife also chooses the teams by mascot names. She usually asks something like, "Who's playing, Bears and Gophers? C'mon, the bears are going to eat those things. I'll pick the bears."

Okay, more soon. Happy Training!

Exhaling, The Friday Top Five, And Where Have I Been?!

2011-03-06T07:47:00.002-05:00

This picture pretty much defines my life. These are my absolutely wonderful five children—all of which with personalities so different that one would think there is no possible way they could all be related. We were on our way to go sledding a couple of weeks ago when I thought I should take a picture of the Fab Five. My daughter, Janina, is the quiet one in the purple. My son Julian, is the one in back who resembles Kenny from the television series South Park.

So, I know what you might be thinking. Where has this guy been? I love writing my blog. Even when I am really busy, I still manage to write a post at least once a week. The last month was probably the busiest month that I can remember in my life. Even while preparing my dissertation defense and getting ready to defend, I was still not as stressed as I was the past week.

I started a position at a new institution after being Composer In Residence at another institution for ten years. It has been a welcome change. I have amazing colleagues, wonderful students, and a very collaborative academic environment. I am a strong believer of collaboration within academia. What do I mean by that? For instance, one of my colleagues has spoken to me about the possibility of co-teaching a course on music and poetry—looking at the way composers treat text in regard to compositional devices: form, rhythm, meter, articulations, harmony, dynamics, phrasing. I work at a place where interdisciplinary projects are the norm—and people get really creative. For instance, I had a conversation with a colleague in mathematics about taking a course on the math of Darmstadt era composers. You see, some composers write with very specific processes. How cool is my job? I am teaching an independent study to a student this semester who is learning improvisation with me. Once a week he puts it into practice by walking over to the dance department with his guitar and accompanying modern classes.

Anyway, the last two weeks I had been preparing a class to teach and an prepping my evening talk as part of the interview process. My father use to say to us that it was okay to fail as long as we gave it everything we had. His viewpoint was that we learn from those experiences. We put our best foot forward, prepare the hell out of something, and hope that we have our best performance on that day. In a lot of ways, it is kind of like triathlon.

I want to thank all my friends, colleagues, and my Trakkers teammates who sent out a lot of love and support the last week wishing my luck. Oh, and of course I would be remiss if I did not mention my super-awesome coach who sent me an email reminding me that I have been preparing for the position my whole life.

So, that is where I have been. In a cave. Well, more like the library, but you get the idea.

The Friday Top Five

1) Pasta: Yeah, I think it should come as NO surprise that pasta is the favorite food of a guy who actually wrote a post titled "Confessions of a Complex Carboholic". It is probably only within this list that I could actually create a subcategory of my favorite pastas as well. How Italian am I?! First on the list for me would be pasta penne vodka. Seriously, how can you go wrong with a sauce made from proscuitto, cream, and vodka? Next would be pasta with pesto (pronounced "pay-sto). We grow our own basil in our garden during the summer. My wife collects a kitchen table's worth by the end of the summer and breaks out the parmesan cheese and oil to make fresh pesto. She jars it, and I consume it in ridiculous amounts on my pasta until it has disappeared and I have to wait another summer to get my fix. I don't think a week went by last summer that I did not make pasta salad—a dish consisting of fresh cavatelli, olive oil, tomato's, basil, garlic, mozzarella cheese. After you pour the warm cavatelli in a bowl bringing out the flavor of the garlic and add the other ingredients, I would always drizzle on a little balsamic vinegar to finish. As I am writing this, I am daydreaming about making lunch today.

2) Pizza: Seriously, I think I could eat pizza everyday of the week if I could eliminate my conscience. I don't like the "healthy" variety of this culinary masterpiece. I prefer thin crust pepperoni pizza, especially the kind made wood fired pizzerias, where the crust gets slightly toasty on the sides. A lot of love in that pizza!

3) Bruschetta: bruschetta \brü-ˈske-tə, -ˈske-\. My memories of bruschetta go back to when I was a small child. My father would cut up pieces of Italian bread from a loaf and put them on a tray in the fireplace to toast. When they got a nice golden brown, he would take a garlic clove and rub it on the bread, followed by a little olive oil and salt. That's it. No tomato's. No cheese, parsley, or citrus like you find at some of these fancy Italian restaurants that claim to be authentic. Nope. Just real good peasant food. He taught me how to make it, and I have taught my children. I don't know why something so simple is so delicious, but it just works. My father would tell me what a wonderful meal it was to have some olives, a couple pieces of cheese, bruschetta, and a glass of wine. Clearly, he was a visionary!

4) Chicken and black bean burrito: I am convinced I am one millionth Mexican, because my hunger for a decent burrito has steadily grown since I first ate one in Ithaca, New York while attending graduate school. It took me nearly 25 years years to eat one, yes. I did eat some authentic mexican food while attending school in Ohio, but I never ordered burritos for some reason. I eat about one a week now. I like them spicy.

5) Coconut Ice Cream: Bizarre, right? Not every place has coconut ice cream, and it has been my experience that either people love it, or hate it. If it is on an ice cream parlor (do people even call it an "ice cream parlor" anymore?), I have to get it.

Training: Needless to say, the training was pretty much non-existant this week. I had a recovery week, so my hours were pretty low anyway—I only had bout five hours of training to do. I did a straight 1500 yard swim on Monday in 27:25 (1:50 pace—hey, I'm not fast... yet!), and I ran yesterday for the first time all week. I did 4x1 mile repeats after a ten minute warm up. My splits were: 8:00. 7:53, 7:48, and 7:42. I am a good minute off my pace from the end of the season last year, but I am sure I will get it back down again..... right?!

Oh! I ran in my NEW Avia Quest Lite's for the first time and I absolutely DIG them. I ran my mile repeats in them. I thought I was going to need a little time breaking them in and perhaps they were not going to be comfortable right away out of the box. I was wrong. If a shoe feels that good out of the box on your first run, I can not wait to feel what it is going to be like after I put some miles in these puppies!

Okay, I am officially ready to post my bike porn in my next post. A lot of my teammates ordered their first Kestrels this season. All I can say is that you will not be disappointed. I spoke to a bunch of my friends about how much more comfortable I have been on this bike already. You know what that mean, right? More comfortable = faster!

Still do not have a name for my new ride. I will need one for the beginning of the season. Perhaps I should have a "Name My New Baby Contest?"

Coach Mary has me doing 10 hours this week. I am looking forward to the therapy after a pretty stressful week last week.

More soon. Train Smart!

The Friday Top Five and Continued Craziness

2011-02-20T14:58:00.001-05:00

The past couple of weeks have been a complete blur, and it is going to continue along this path until the end of April. I am premiering a new work on April 1 to mark the 175th anniversary of a local university. Yes, I am aware that it is on April Fools Day, and if I don't start cranking out some music very quickly in the month of March, the joke will definitely be on them!

I have been trying to desperately to meet all my workouts during the week, but I have missed a couple this week. When it comes down to keeping my job or training, my job seems to wins out for some strange reason. Something about ensuring I can provide for my family seems to be more of a priority. I have been really burning it at both ends—of course, it seems like all my friends are right along there with me. If it were not for wifey, I don't know how we would ever survive. She has been maintaing status quo for the better part of the year as I have been commuting an hour to work each way every day. Ugh.

The good news? I am eating everything in sight just to keep on weight. Ice cream, cake, fudge. Ah, training does have its advantages.

The Friday Top Five: After much consideration, and after speaking with many of my colleagues who are guitar instructors at colleges and universities around the country, I have compiled the definitive list of the top five greatest rock guitarists of all time.

The criteria for this list are: originality, facility, and innovation. These guitarists not only played amazingly, but they completely changed the way in which players approach the instrument. Without further adieu, they are:

#5 Chuck Berry—Berry was unquestionably the first giant of rock and roll guitar. There would be no rock and roll guitar if it were not for Chuck Berry. Some rock and roll scholars say that he and Little Richard single-handedly invented the genre (even though the term rock and roll was coined by New York DJ Alan Freed who use to play black R&B after hours on the radio). Sure, Elvis might have been anointed the "King of Rock and Roll," but if it were not for Chuck, Elvis might not ever have happened. The cool thing about Chuck is that his guitar was always out of tune and he played with a sincerity. He also wrote some of the best anthems to the playing of rock and roll in Johnny B. Goode, Roll Over Beethoven, and Rock and Roll Music.

#4 Eddie Van Halen—Although he did not invent finger tapping, he certainly helped popularize the technique which culminated in the recording of Eruption. Equally important was Van Halen's use of tuning and volume swells. More, the dude has played with everyone from Dweezil Zappa to Thomas Dolby, oh, not to mention playing the solo on a little tune by Michael Jackson titled Beat It. He was quite possibly the guitar hero for every single young aspiring guitarist from my generation. 1984 came out when I was in seventh grade and I remember thinking, who is this dude playing guitar?

#3 Jeff Beck—This former Yardbirds frontman went on to influence thousands of guitarists with his blending of Indian music with jazz and rock. He lists Ravi Shankar as one of his greatest influences. You probably don't know Beck's solo work unless you are a true rock guitarist aficionado, but you ought to go and discover it if you don't know it yet.

#2 Jimmy Hendrix—Definitely did not have the greatest facility as some of other rock guitarists, but his use of timbre and texture by means of distortion were revolutionary, not to mention, he was one incredible songwriter. I still get goosebumps every time I hear Hey Joe. His performances to me are spiritual. His impromptu performance on the Dick Cavett show was legendary. Besides, who else played so well with his teeth and could burn his guitar and then smash the hell out of it and look cool doing it? Unfortunately, he had to join the 27 club along with Janis Joplin and Jim Morrison, much to the disillusionment of a hippie generation searching for some utopian drug induced Nirvana. Speaking of Nirvana, Kurt Cobain was the most recent addition to the 27 club.

#1 Steve Vai—In 1979, Steve Vai mailed Frank Zappa a transcription (taking a melody or rhythm that has been improvised, and writing it out with musical notation) of his tune The Black Page. There are not too many other guitarists in history that have the theoretical chops to be able to do that. Zappa was so impressed that he hired Vai in 1979 to transcribe a bunch of his guitar solos.

Okay, I know what you're thinking—there are some noticeable exceptions here. Where is Jimmy Page? Yeah, well, here's the deal with Jimmy: I think the band Led Zeppelin was incredibly innovative, and Page was an amazing song writer (quite possibly the best guitarist-songwriter in rock and roll history), but he essentially played tasty rhythm and blues licks with a whole lot of distortion. So did Hendrix, but Hendrix use of distortion and sound producing techniques (like playing Little Wing through a Leslie speaker normally used for a Hammond organ), inspired scours of heavy metal bands to experiment with sound in an outside of the studio during the late 1970's and early 1980's. So, my list of honorable mentions include: JimmyPage, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Johnny Ramone, Mark Knopfler, George Harrison and Kirk Hammett.

Training: Like I said at the beginning of my post, I have gotten most of my workouts in this week. Sorry Coach Mary, but I only managed to get in one swim this week—yikes! I had one of the worst runs of my training on Thursday.

Have you ever gone out for an easy training run and it just felt like you couldn't find your rhythm? Well, it was not exactly a easy zone two run—I did some zone 3 work at 5x5:00 intervals with 2:00 rest in between. I never quite got into a groove. I had an awesome 1.5 hour bike ride yesterday, followed by a kick-ass 1.5 hour zone 2 run today. I am actually running faster in zone 2. I never thought it would happen! I guess Coach Mary does indeed know what she's talking about. Go figure! The good news was I came home that day to a package from SBR—one of the Trakkers team sponsors this season. Yeah, let me just talk to you a second about this stuff. Do you dislike smelling like chlorine? This is the real deal. I am not embarrassed to admit that I broke out with a tube of the TRISWIM Lotion at the campus gym the other day after my swim and then subsequently offered it to the guys in the locker room. The TRISLIDE is the true bomb-diggity, no lie. I only recently discovered it when a couple of my soon-to-be teammates were ~~accosting u~~s letting us try it out at Rev3 Cedar Point last season. Yeah, there is NOTHING like this. I have used some other stuff to get my wetsuit on and off and to prevent chafing, but I actually refer to this as my "Magic in a Can". I actually had been using Foggle for the past year and can tell you that the rubber on your goggles will snap before you have to buy a new pair because of fogging. Anyway, thanks SBR!

I have to say a big thank you to First Endurance nutrition for coming on board and being part of the Trakkers team. Of course, as you can see, I did not need to be sold on First Endurance. I have been using it since last season when Kelly C. turned me onto it. I have to say, I have been very pleased with the results. I can not do a swim workout without my EFS Grape drink. It's just how I roll. First Endurance will also be the official drink of my Ragnerite team this May as me and eleven other insane people attempt to run a relay race from Woodstock to Manhattan (approximately 184.1 miles), but who's counting?

Yeah, life can be good, right? Here are Julian and Stella saluting with some wine-water. What? We're Italian, we start early in our house.

Train Smart!

Where Did I Put My Mind? AND The Friday Top Five

2011-02-12T11:10:00.000-05:00

The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they're okay, then it's you. ~Rita Mae Brown

When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained. ~Mark Twain

How do you know when you are losing your mind?

Oh, please, let me tell you. I think I am officially certifiable.

How do I know? I have been running around like a chicken with my head cut off. (I have always found that expression hysterical, as well as "I'll never get out of this world alive." What does that mean?)

This might be the CRAZIEST thing I have ever done in my life:

I went downtown yesterday to meet a couple of my colleagues and talk some music. Afterwards, I drove a a cello over to a local luthier for one of my students to be fixed. When I was done, I had to go back to the Sibley Music Library—which is part of the Eastman School of Music. The library is located on a one-way city street. I was in a hurry to get up to the library and get some research done for an article I have been working on. I spent thirty minutes in the library gathering materials, doing some writing on my computer. I gathered up all my materials to make my way out the door. I went to grab my keys in my pocket—not there. Uh-oh. My keys are NOT in my pocket! What does this mean?

I start panicking. If I locked my keys in my car, I am in BIG trouble. It's 5:00 p.m. Wifey is at a rehearsal until 10:00 p.m. The children are at home with a sitter for an hour before I get home and make dinner, and put them in bed. If I locked my keys in the car, there is no one that can come out and bring me a spare set.

I walk down the stairs of the library to street level, all the while scheming how I will break into my car. Remember the old days when you locked your keys in your car and could just stick a coat hanger down through the window (open or not) and release the latch on the door. Ah, the 1970's. Anyway, I walk down to the street and see that not only have I locked my keys in my car, but I also left my lights on. This can only mean one thing. I left the keys in the ignition. Yeah, that's right. Keys in the ignition, and left the car running for thirty-five minutes on a busy city street. How on Earth someone did not jump into my open vehicle and drive off never to be seen again is beyond me. Although, let me just take a moment to thank all you would-be criminals for not ripping the serial number from my Toyota Camry and putting it on a truck to Mexico to be sold for scrap. If there was a regional "Stupidity Award" I would have unquestionably won it yesterday.

First, let me say that being part of the Trakkers family thus far has been an unbelievable experience. The greatest part of it this team for me is to have a group of age-groupers who are as terribly stretched as me with their personal lives, jobs, children, training and everything and anything else we try to fit into a twenty-four hour day. My teammates understand how difficult it is to balance your personal, professional, and athletic lives. For instance, the next few weeks are going to be incredibly crazy for me with work

THE FRIDAY TOP FIVE

I sometimes get into these completely esoteric conversations with some of my musical colleagues scattered about the country about who the greatest songwriters, guitarists, and albums of all time. My Friday Top Five this week include five albums that I could not live without if stranded on a desert island. What are yours?

#5) Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots — The Flaming Lips: This concept album tells the story of one brave heroine who uses karate in her epic battle against savage robots from outer space. Years from now, I think this album will be as important as The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds, Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band by The Beatles. The tunes on here are well written, and the lyrics are crafty. I would need some thing in my years of solitude that would remind me of the hustle and bustle of life in the new millennium and how one might, say, leave their car on a busy city street with their car running. The album is a great combination of old-shcool rock meets Karlheinz Stockhausen

#4) Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band — The Beatles: Speaking of concept albums and Karlheinz Stockhausen—who was on the cover art—this masterpiece of rock and roll transcends generations for its ability to stay current through the decades. The albums eclectic use of orchestration—quite literally—includes clarinet on When I'm Sixty-four, a string quartet and harp on She's Leaving Home, a harpsichord on Fixing a Hole, tubular bells and a French horn quartet on Sgt. Peppers.

#3) The Art of The Fugue — Bach (as played by Glenn Gould). The Art of the Fugue has always mystified me. Trying to figure this out is like trying to decipher hieroglyphics or read sanskrit with a decoder ring out of a Lucky Charms box. Plus, I would definitely need something a bit more cerebral with a lifetime to figure out.

#2) Requiem — Gabriel Fauré: Ah, a requiem you say? A Mass for the dead? Yes, but this is not your Great, Great, Great, Great, Great Grandfather's Requiem. The Faurè requiem is the "kinder", "gentler" version of this old school favorite. Composed between 1887, and 1890, Faure replaces the usual Dies Irae (Day of Wrath) with the Pie Jesu (a motet derived from the final couplet of the Dies Irae). More importantly, I would need something to listen to as the coconuts and fresh water slowly run out.

#1) Music for 18 Musicians —Steve Reich: This iconic American composer, whose name has been synonymous with minimalism for over forty years, wrote several great works, but none of which really resonate with me as much as this composition. It is a masterpiece in form and timbre that allows the listener to groove with the music, or merely lie back on the sand and enter a deep meditative state. If you have not discovered this work yet, go immediately to your library and check this one out. You can thank me later.

OH, the bike porn is coming, the bike porn is coming. Here is a little taste. Isn't she pretty? I named my last bike—actually Alexa named her—Cookie Monster. The jury is out on my new ride. Any suggestions? I will write my official post of my trip down to Geneva Bicycle (voted one of the top 50 bicycle shops in the country) to be fitted for my Kestrel later this week.

Did I mention I'm losing my mind?

Some Updates: The Ragner Relay that I am running with eleven of my closest friends (including wifey) is coming together. So far, we have nine runners committed. We have decided to name our team "The White Hots". Rochester, NY is the home of Zewigels hot dogs—a local landmark.

I got some love from Trakkers this week. They sent me a team Trakkers water bottle, some tattoos, and a new Trakkers visor! Here is Janina. Why do all my girls have bandaids on their melons at one time or another? I think they think it is a piece of jewelry.

Thanks for reading. Train Smart!

The Sunday Update: A Week Of Craziness

2011-02-06T23:01:00.000-05:00

A bit crazy at the moment! It seems like the weeks have been flying by at a frantic pace. Part of the craziness is due in part to how unbelievably busy I have been with work. The first couple of weeks back to campus are always a bit hectic as I get my "sea legs" back. I am also working on a new commission that is due in March—not a lot of time. I was originally going to swim Tuesdays and Thursdays this semester, but I can swim at lunchtime on Monday and Wednesday's on campus, so that is when I am doing it.

I have been feeling pretty guilty about missing some of my workouts these past couple of weeks, but all I can do is try to get back on track and finish some of my current projects. The great thing about you learn about stress as you grow older is that you understand that it is always temporary. There is a cyclical nature to stress.

Training: I managed to get in my two long swim workouts. Coach Mary has me swimming for time right now rather than distance. I would much rather swim for an hour than have to swim 'X' amount of yards. I don't know why. It is psychological for sure. For some reason, swimming an hour doesn't really seem like that long, but lately sitting on a bike for even an hour has seemed like an incredible lesson in patience. I remember a time when I first started training for triathlons—four years ago—when swimming 1200 yards seemed like agony (I won't even tell you how long it took me). I will tell you that at my first sprint triathlon it took me a good 24 minutes to get out of the water. I swam 3000 yards on both Monday and Wednesday this week. Even last year when I was training for my first Iron distance event at Rev3 Cedar Point, I rarely swam that distance. Truth be told—I am actually enjoying swimming as an exercise. Coach Mary has made my swim workouts much more manageable. That is

I had a two hour ride yesterday. I was trying to decide between the Rockumentary about 80's Canadian heavy metal band, Anvil, or There Will Be Blood. One of the advantages of long trainer rides during the winter months is that I get to catch up all the movies wifey and I can not see in theaters. Trying to find a sitter for five children is about as easy and trying to convince my wife that training for triathlons really does not take that much discretionary time. To be honest, if and when my wife and I get a sitter, we would much rather go out and have a bite to eat and talk than sit in a movie theater. Actually, the last movie we saw in a theater together was Tangled which we saw the brood. The movie that we saw prior to that was Toy Story 3. Yup, we don't get out that much. I went with the Anvil story. If you have not seen it, do yourself a favor. You don't even have to like rock, or metal for that matter to enjoy this real-life Spinal Tap-esque documentary. Hysterical.

I had a pretty terrible run today. I think it was a result of getting too little sleep last night and not properly hydrating the evening before my run, or this morning. The wifey and I went out to dinner last night with my brother and sister-in-law. We all had a little vino. Then we went to see the film The King's Speech. Yes, we got a sitter—grandma! Anyway, I had to take my run much slower this afternoon to stay within my HR zone 2.

Okay, I know I missed the Friday Top Five this week. Perhaps I will double up next week?

The Kestrel is built, but I am not riding it just yet as I ordered a new pair of pedals and am waiting to see what I want to do with my wheels. As soon as I figure that out, pics to come!

As with the stress, the blog posts become more frequent as the real life craziness calms down to a manageable insane level. Oh, did I mention I am now coaching Luca's travel baseball team? Yeah, did not have enough going on.

More Soon.... really ! Train Smart !

The Friday Top Five (On Sunday)

2011-01-30T10:58:00.003-05:00

I've thought about this a while now, and in an effort to have a consistent piece on this blog, I have decided to have what I will henceforth refer to as "The Friday Top Five." In this new "piece" I will continue to subject you all to my completely biased, subjective opinions on matters of triathlon and anything else I feel like torturing you with. Your welcome in advance for the forty-some remaining weeks of the calendar year. Alas! Look on the bright side: if the Mayans are correct, you should only have to put up with my insipid verbiage for but one more year. If I were a betting man, my guess is that the universe will not implode on itself to the size of an atom, and that you will have to go on living with my acute, yet banal, observations and growing neuroticism. Lucky you.

This semester, I am teaching the greatest class in the history of classes taught at the college level—History of Rock and Roll. I have noticed a really interesting phenomenon with my teenage and twenty-something year old students. They know a lot of music from the late 1960's and early 1970's (much more than the generation of students ten years their seniors), because of things like Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Others, now have parents that grew up in the generation after the Baby Boomers who actually rocked out to The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Who and The Rolling Stones. Most of my students know music from a really narrow window from about 1968-1978. Seriously, most of my students were born after Nirvana's Nevermind was released on Geffen back in 1991. Obviously rock and roll music did not start in 1991, although grunge certainly did, and soon became a widespread commodity to a growing number of white middle class teenagers—just like every other style of music before and after it. Of course, grunge was around before Nirvana. Bands like Sonic Youth and Mudhoney helped to coin the term when talking about their own music, but I remember Nirvana being one of the defining moments of my young musical career. Here were these three white dudes from Seattle playing music that rocked even harder than anything I had ever heard on MTV's Headbangers Ball back in the late 1980's, and they were doing so while donning flannel, torn jeans and sneakers, instead of hair with an insane amount of Aqua Net, and enough makeup and spandex to make Roxanne blush. I knew immediately upon hearing Nirvana—without ever hearing anything from the music rags and talking heads—that this band was definitely ground breaking. Did not end well. I love being able to speak anecdottaly about my experiences with the music. It is really hard to feel "old" talking about Nirvana because I still think of them as really current.

Anyway, one of the things that I get to speak is who I think the best rock singers in history are (I have a PhD in Music—I'm able to decide such things). Throughout the semester, we get to engage with all of this great music and the artists who recorded it.

Without further adieu, here are my Top Five singers in rock and roll history, with some honorable mentions:

#1: Freddie Mercury: Not a good looking man, but apparently rock singers do not need to be attractive for throngs of women (and men) to go completely hysterical at the mere sight of them (see: Mick Jagger, Steven Tyler, and David Bowie). You've never seen as many lighters in the air as when Freddy sang Bohemian Rhapsody to an appreciative Wembley Stadium crowd. His voice is dynamic and identifiable, and he can belt it and sing the ballad.

#2: Robert Plant: The lion-maned frontman of one of the most influential rock groups in history—Led Zeppelin admittedly modeled his singing after early African-American blues singers Ma Rainey and Big Mama Thorton. He had an incredible stage presence and when I listen to Zeppelin tunes like "Black Dog," "Rock and Roll," or "Kashmir" on my iPod while I am training, I have to control my testosterone from making me want to run through walls.

#4 Ozzy Osbourne: Even if you do not like his music, this one-time frontman for Black Sabbath whose career has spanned over forty years, had an unbelievable dynamic range an had some of the most incredible intonation (ability to sing on pitch) of any rock singer in history. The Prince of Darkness and Godfather of Heavy Metal has sold over 100 million albums worldwide. That is more than John Tesh and Yanni combined. His reality T.V. show, The Osbournes, introduced a whole new generation to the lifestyle of rich and underserving privileged children of rock icons.

#5: John Lennon: C'mon, what would a list of the greatest rock singers of all time be without the man who sang I Want to Hold Your Hand and Helter Skelter? Those two tunes have dramatically different vocal styles. More, Lennon could be expressive and lyrical with tunes like "Nowhere Man," and deliver in the stuttering vocal declamation of "Come Together." Like Mozart (who lived to only thirty-five years), it would have been fascinating to hear what Lennon's musical output would have been like had his life not been tragically cut short.

#5 Steve Parry: I know what you're thinking, Steve Parry, really.. are you sure you don't mean Steven Tyler. No. I feel funny putting Parry here, because the music is a bit cheesy. Okay, it's a lot cheesy, and I am embarrassed to admit that I can sing just about every lyric from every tune Journey wrote.
The once frontman of the rock band Journey had an amazing instrument—not to mention wrote some of the most catchy rock tunes of the late eighties. Heck, Journey even had a video game. You know you've made it when you have a video game. I think everyone who went to school in the eighties had the tunes "Open Arms" or "Faithfully" as one of the themes for their school dances. The school dance tune was swiftly replaced for the next ten years by the Boyz II Men song "It's So Hard to Say Goodbye to Yesterday."

Honorable Mentions: David Lee Roth, Sting, Bono, Janis Joplin, Roger Daltrey, Jim Morrison

Now, for all you talking heads out there, notice, I did not say most influential. That would be a completely different list. Dylan would be on that top five. Coincidentally, Rolling Stone listed the top 100 singers of all time. Number one on the list was Aretha Franklin. I might have to agree with that analysis. She can sing everything.

Training: Have you ever had one of those weeks that has completely kicked your ass? Wow. I was SO incredibly busy with work and my personal life this week that trying to fit in my training was.... well... insane! I missed a couple of workouts, but I tried not to miss consecutive swims or bikes or runs. I missed one swim and one bike. I am a slacker, what can I say? I feel awfully guilty, but I have so many projects on the burner that I really have to concentrate on.

The good news? I got fitted for my new Kestrel (post to follow). It is beautiful, and the fitting was amazing. I have never been as comfortable on a bike as I am on this one—really! I think my Trakkers teammates are going to be VERY excited about their new rides—especially those of us who live near the Arctic Circle who will not have a chance to bike outside until say... our first triathlon in June. Okay, I am exaggerating a bit, but just a bit.

My hydration during my workouts has been a lot better thanks in part to my First Endurance drink. I have both the Grape and Fruit Punch flavors and enjoy them when I train. I have a tendency to cramp up, especially in my swim because I often forget to hydrate as much as I should during the day. If you have not tried First Endurance yet, I highly recommend that at the very least, you get on board and try it for a couple of weeks of workouts. I like it because it is not real sugary either.

Okay gang, my Kestrel post to follow. Another busy week, but I hope to be communicating from the craziness.

More Soon. Train Smart!

Running in Ragnar And Ready for Redemption

2011-01-21T15:05:00.000-05:00

Being sick for ten days has really sucked. I sometimes will express my hatred of being sick to the wifey.
She finds it especially funny when I complain about having the stomach bug. No one ever says, "you know... I haven't had chronic diarrhea and vomited in a while, that would be really great." Having the flu is the absolute worst. I'm not there. I just have this chronic cough and chest cold that is making working out impossible. Have any of you ever had that experience when you feel so awful that it is tiring to climb the stairs? I know when I am really sick, because when I lay down in bed, I just crash as if I hadn't just gotten a full night of sleep. I tried "taking it easy" for a couple of days. I tried working out through my sickness. That just made it a bit worse. Because my throat has felt slightly sore, I have not wanted to drink, so I have been getting dehydrated.

I am ready to announce some pretty amazing news.

I am racing a 24-hour relay in May called the Ragnar Relay. Ragnar has a bunch of relays all over the country. I decided that doing this would be:

1) fun
2) slightly crazy
3) a great story to tell my grandchildren
4) possibly life-threatening (in the dark, there could be bears out there in the middle of the wilderness, ya know)
5) A rare opportunity to spend a day with eleven of my tired, hungry, smelly friends.
6) A fun preparation for Rev3 Quassay and Rev3 Cedar Point.

The course starts at Colony of the Arts in Woodstock, New York and finishes in New York City.

The best part about doing THIS race is that the wifey has signed up with me! Wifey does not do a lot of races on account of:

1) her dislike of running

2) she is not competitive at ALL. I think it is a dancer thing. Every dancer I know is non-competitive. I think it has something to do with the aesthetic.

I think wifey also agreed to do this race because it is slightly crazy. The wifey likes slightly crazy things, thus, me! Here is the best part. There is something you do not know about wifey. She's a legitimate ringer. She might not train a ton now, but she has serious game. Like, way more game than I could possibly hope to have. Let me put things into perspective for you:

Wifey was invited to the Lake Placid Olympic development camp in high school. One day, last summer, my wife decides to go out and run my 10k course for giggles. Wifey does not train. Wifey runs the occasional 5k on a treadmill at the gym two or three times a week. Wifey goes out and runs 6:15's. She comes back sweating and a bit tired, but not in need of oxygen like I would have been.

So, the breakdown of the running for the twelve of us will look something like this:

I really do not care what leg I run. I just think this will be an absolute blast. The hardest part of the race for Alaina and I will not be staying up all night and running, but rather, trying to find someone to watch out brood for four days.

In Other News: My Garmin 310XT heart rate monitor decided to completely die. Crazy. The funny thing is my Timex Ironman race kit is still taking a licking and ticking. Garmin replaced my monitor two days later, and I am happy to say that I have a heart rate again.

Training: I finally worked out yesterday for the first workout since Saturday. I did a two hour ride on Saturday that left me feeling terrible again. Since coming back from Seattle two weeks ago, I feel like I have not been more than 85%. I got in the pool last night and did 3000 yards in one hour. I actually swam 2500 free, then started on my 800 kick. Yes, I used fins. Otherwise I would still be there. I think I could have done a bit more if it was not my first workout back in a few days off. However, when I hit the wall at 500 yards into the kick, my right leg started severely cramping. Dehydration is such an odd feeling.

On the docket are a one hour zone two run tonight and a one hour tempo run tomorrow. With almost a week off from running, it will be interesting to see how my body reacts. I think I vaguely remember how to run.

More soon. Train Smart!

Back By Popular Demand: The Nephews

2011-01-16T09:52:00.000-05:00

When I raced my first Ironman at REV3 Cedar Point back in September, my nephews met me out in Ohio to act as my support group for the weekend. They were fabulous, and comic. To know them is to love them. I am happy to announce that the comedic pair has agreed to come out once again this summer to spend a weekend with me in Ohio as I set my sights on "getting even" with that little thing called the marathon. I have a score to settle with the marathon at REV3 Cedar Point.

My nephews are twenty-something young professionals. My nephew Nicholas is a mechanical engineer, and Michael (at the wheel) is a marketing guru.

One look at this video and you will immediately understand why I enjoyed having them around with me Ironman weekend. They do not take themselves, or Ironman, too seriously. They kept the mood incredibly light, and just went along with the flow. Awesome.

Training: I think I tried to come back to soon after being sick. I had a two hour trainer ride yesterday (that was truncated to an hour and fortyy-five minutes. When I was done, I was literally spent—dripping from head to tow. My body did not feel right. Last night, I paid for it. The wonderful phlegm I started coughing up reminded me that I am in fact, not immortal as I previously thought. I am really disappointed because I have wanted to get in a long run for some time and I had an hour run scheduled for today. My body just feels terrible still. This is SO frustrating! What do you do? Take two or three days off?

I am back at the Colleges this week teaching, so I want to be healthy for that as well. There is nothing worse than sitting in front of a class lecturing while you feel your lungs are about to collapse, or you have a sinus headache.

I have a pretty long swim workout next week that includes an 800 kick. Yes.... an 800 kick, so I would like to be healthy for that. Oh, and I would like to grow fins for that as well.

More soon. Train Smart!

Sickness in Seattle

2011-01-12T22:22:00.001-05:00

My trip out to Seattle for the premiere of my new piece, Chromium Music went well. I consider myself really fortunate that I get to work with so many super-talented musicians as part of my job. What made this especially great is that the group's inaugural performance also came with a CD release—which included two of my compositions. It was also especially rewarding that I got to travel to Seattle to work my friend, choreographer Missy Pfohl Smith. Missy is the Director for the Center of Movement and Dance Studies at the University of Rochester and is the Artistic Director for the established modern dance company, BIODANCE. The wifey dances with Missy's company.

Being the conscientiousness triathlete that I am, I remembered to pack gear giving any set of circumstances that I might encounter. My wife had to hold me back from bringing a pair of bike shoes, but you can bet I brought jammers, a swim cap, goggles, cold-weather running gear (yes, tights too), gloves, and running shoes. Oh, I also brought bike shorts, just in case I found a place to bike indoors.

However, I made one fatal error in getting ready for my little excursion out to the Pacific Northwest—I forgot to bring my water bottle. Not good. Have you ever been on a flight for six hours with less than 18 ounces of fluid to drink? Amazingly, I always get sick after flying. I am hereby convinced that any future plane rides will have me ingesting a considerable amount of Airborne or Emergen-C.

You see, when I do not have my water bottle, I somehow manage to completely forget to drink. Upon arriving at our guest's home, I did manage to inhale three or four glasses of water before crashing. Too late. The damage was slowly and quietly uncoiling my immune system to system failure.

I am not sure what kind of triathlon scene Seattle has, but with all of its many small lakes nestled around the city, I thought it was a perfect place to hold a kick-ass event. Of course, the water never actually gets very warm during the summer. Bonus—WETSUIT!

The morning after my arrival, I headed down to a place called Green Park with my friend/Seattle tour guide/violinist Jo. We did some running. It was fairly warm—upper 40's, low 50's—and it was drizzling all day and overcast. Imagine that. Raining in Seattle.

Proof that even musicians are bad-ass runners!

We went back to the house and got cleaned up to accompany joe to the luthier (someone who makes or repairs string instruments.) I felt like I was at a old world grocer.

Yes, I will take half a pound of the Stradivarius, and quarter pound of Guarneri please.

Shortly after that, we made our way to rehearsal, BUT, not before stopping for lunch.

Jo said it was mandatory to stop and do the appropriate touristy thing and get a picture taken at this statue. I think this looks like an album cover gone terribly awry.

We made our way down to Pike's Street Market. If you go to Seattle, check this joint out. It is the bomb-diggity of all street markets.

The market is a great place if you like seafood. GUILTY.

The Pike Street Market also caters to the Italiano. Have I died and gone to Heaven?

Despite incessant pleading, and a very generous tip, this sitar player simply refused to play Free Bird.

The only negative about the whole trip was my return back home. I got really sick on the plane ride back—from being dehydrated and exhausted and was laid out incapacitated in bed for twenty-four hours.

So, here I am three days later... still in recovery.

Training: The training had been going really well until I came home sick. I had to take a complete day off today, so that I can get some rest and try to hit a swim/run in the morning.

I had my second swim test of the season. Survey says: FASTER! Something I am doing in the pool definitely working.

Okay.. I need sleep. More soon. Train Smart!

Holy Heart Rate Homeboy!

2011-01-06T12:34:00.000-05:00

Oh Heart Rate... you really rue the day.

My last four weeks of training have been great, and I contribute that to a number of factors:

1) I have an exceptional new coach who is accessible and makes my swim workouts tolerable.

2) I have made the Trakkers Team and have a lot of great new teammates to bounce ideas off of.

3) I have a positive mental attitude.

4) Am learning that proper hydration and a minimum of seven hours of sleep can go a long way.

Unfortunately, with only three seasons of triathlon under my belt, I am at that point of knowing just enough to be dangerous.

For instance, this season, I actually took the time to learn the difference between a tubular and a clincher tire. Sure, simple enough you say. I had always heard the terms, but thought they were associated with World Wrestling Federation moves performed by the likes of Superfly Jimmy Snuka:

"... He's got him in the dreaded tubular now... and it appears... yes.. my goodness... he went right into a full clincher."

You know.. in a lot of ways, professional wrestling is just like triathlon. You get to wear a lot of tight spandex without anyone looking at you funny. The competitors are spent, and soaked in sweat while hugging their teammates at the end of the competition, and both sports have athletes that enjoy throwing their arms in the air, and making the number one sign while shouting like an air raid siren for some odd reason.

Oh, for those of you who are unfamiliar with these therms, :

Tubular: A type of tire mainly used for racing. A tubular tire has no beads; instead, the two edges of the carcass are sewn together (hence the term "sew-up") with the inner tube inside. Tubulars fit only on special rims, where they are held on by cement. If you do not glue those puppies on correctly, they can come undone, you could crash, and most certainly die, or at the very least, be held up in a hospital bed for 6 to 8 months.

Clincher: This is the normal type of tire—you know, with the rubber balloon inside of the tire, referred to as a tube. It fits inside the tire and is mounted to the rim.

If you want to sound really smart talking to the bike shop mechanic next time you are there, check out Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Glossary.

So, about this heart rate thing. Apparently Coach Mary thought I knew things like my lactate threshold, maximum heart rate, and who this Joel Friel guy is. Heck, I still do not understand the difference between a $150 and $500 dollar wetsuit, and I am totally convinced that Andy Potts could beat me wearing one of those suits from 20,000 Leagues under the sea, much in the same way Lance could smoke me in a time trial riding a 1970's Schwinn.

Coach Mary—the greatest, most patient coach on the planet—had me doing a lot of my early base stuff in zone 2. Unfortunately, for the first two weeks of training, I really had no idea what my zone 2 was, nor was I overly concerned until I remembered the reason I decided to work with a coach was so that I would actually improve my results from last season. I think she probably thought, this guy has some experience. He understands zone 2. Negative Ghost Rider. So, I took a lactate threshold test with a nerdy science friend of mine, and learned that my HR zones were off. Way off. I had previously thought that the ceiling for my zone 2 was somewhere around 125-127. Turns out, my ceiling is closer to 165 in zone 2. How did I get 125ish? Well, if you plug your maximum HR into your fancy Garmin by doing the unofficial "poor-man's" method of figuring out your HR (i.e. 220 minus your age), Garmin will conveniently spit out some generic HR zones for that work equally well for me as they do for the guy who smokes two packs of Marlboro's a day. It only makes sense that I should have a higher maximum HR than cancer stick guy. Now that I understand the zones, it is still a challenge to be patient and remain within them. I find little things like ego and boredom start creeping in and I just want to run. However, I understand what the idea is: slowly and steadily build up your zone 2 to allow yourself to run faster in that HR zone. In other words, I want to go from running a 9:30 mile in zone two to running and 8:30. Duh! There is no getting away with anything. I wear my HR monitor (most days—and when I don't, there are severe consequences).

Twilight Update: As many of you are aware of, the wifey and I have watched the first three Twilight movies and I hate to admit it—but I was completely ~~sucked~~, er... ~~bitten~~.... I mean... we really liked this teenage campy movie. I am totally Team Alice for sure.

So the wifey and I were sitting around the other night having a serious conversation about this whole vampire/werewolf thing. Here are some questions we have about all of it:

1) So, if Edward and what's her face get together, are they unable to procreate because he is.... you know... dead?

2) Do vampires poop? I mean honestly, they don't eat.

3) Can Edward and Bella have children? AND, if so, isn't it going to be weird once their kids are finally older than their parents?

Okay... plane to Seattle is calling... gotta run. More soon. Happy Training!

New Years 7.5 Miler Race Report

2011-01-02T12:49:00.001-05:00

I was pretty excited to get out there New Years morning and run.

It was 50˚ F this morning at 10 a.m. at the start of the race. Last year for this same race it was 2˚ F. I did not run the race last year because I do not run outside when it is 2˚ F. I believe only polar bears and abominable snowmen should run after prey when it is 2˚ F.

My instructions from Coach Mary were simple: "go all out." Actually... it was worded a bit more colorfully than that, but in an effort to keep my blog PG-rated, let's just say for all intensive purposes it was worded with the aforementioned rhetoric.

My extraordinarily tall blogger buddy Alexa—yes, I am laying it on thick, I know she's tiny as a tree elf—agreed to come out to the race to snap a few photos of me enjoying my 7.5 miler scamper. In exchange, I am Alexa's official therapist. Of course, this means I will have to pay it forward sometime and go out to one of her races and snap some action shots. I will have to snap fast though. Alexa's all business.
Alexa's an Ironman. Can you tell?

Here I am with fellow Y buddy Nick

"Hamming" it up at the beginning of my race.

So fast that I am blurry and not even touching the ground.

The actual race was great fun. I felt like I was in much better shape than when I went out and ran my Thanksgiving Day 10k. That day was quite dreadful. It was cold, windy, and I was sick with a head cold.

By the miles:

Mile 1: Realized that I should have warmed up longer, but unfortunately I saw about a dozen people I know at the race and spent a little too much time fraternizing, and not enough warming up.

Mile 2: Feeling a little frustrated that I started so far back in the pack of runners. It took until the middle of mile two to clear some space for me to run.

Mile 3: Thankful that I am finally warmed up. My 8:40 starting pace is gradually getting faster. I was running a solid 9:00 minute mile up some of the hills.

Mile 4: Trying to stay positive and push my pace a little. Trying not to let my Thanksgiving Day run creep into my memory, when my race was essentially over at mile four because I felt so terrible.

Mile 5: Have been running after the girl with the green shorts since mile 1. Still trying to catch her.

Mile 6: Know that I have to keep my tempo up or turn it up if I ever want to catch the young running couple in front of me who seem to be casually going for an afternoon stroll. This was the hardest part of the run. Long, steady incline here. I was trying to keep my heart rate a little in check so I still had legs to make my final triumphant surge toward the finish and New Years Race immortality.

Mile 7: Pass running couple. Still gunning for green-short girl. Ran really hard the last quarter mile, but she ran harder.

The Data:

151/357 Overall

119/242 M

AG ? They could not read my age for some reason. There is a big question mark next to it.

Overall, I am fairly pleased with the result. I mean, I would have loved to have won, but you know... it's early in the season and all. Kidding. I am really excited to see where I am come spring.

There you go. It is all there. I can not fudge the data!

More soon. Train Smart!

Pros and Cons Of Being A Monster

2010-12-28T05:31:00.000-05:00

Okay, I know that Twilight is one of the most cliche teenage vampire movies of all time. Unquestionably the most cliche teenage vampire film of all time—The Lost Boys—is from my generation. It starred both of the now infamous 80's Corey's (Haim and Feldman), and the ever-popular Kip Winger look-alike, Kiefer Sutherland. Anyway, Twilight is exactly the kind of mind-numbing mindless dribble I was looking for when logging hours on my trainer. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of playing a bit of it for wifey. After the first five minutes she looked at me and said "... this is SO silly." After 15 minutes, I asked her if she wanted me to turn it off. Wifey said... "nah... it's okay, go ahead, we can watch it." After a half hour, if I even cleared my throat, she was shushing me. It does not matter if it is blood-sucking vampires, women dig the chick flicks, even vampire chick flicks. Okay.. don't go calling me misogynistic... I mean by the end of the second Twilight film—New Moon—wifey was saying things like:

"... she can't be with Jacob. Edward is her first love," and "She so has to choose Edward. He is so mysterious."

Mysterious?!!

This has prompted me to walk around the house most of the day with furrowed eyebrows and answering everything in riddle-like form. I'll show her mysterious.

Here is what I've learned from Twilight:

1) Women love romance. No matter how campy the movie is.
2) Vampires, although pale-faced and downright scary, can be wooed by women as long as they have bushy eyebrows, a thick head of hair, and drive a really shiny sports car.
3) Certain women gravitate towards the "bad boy" persona. What is more bad ass than saying... "Mom, meet my new boyfriend, Dracula."
4) If any of my daughter's self esteems were so low that they were willing to become an undead vampire to impress a boy, I have probably failed as a parent.
5) Werewolves, although terribly frightening are World class cliff divers. Who knew?

* = indicates a specific triathlon strength.

PROS:

- Immortality
- Get to meet a lot of really cool historical figures over the next hundred years
- Can go to medical school and still have enough time to pay back your school loans
- Never have to worry about your Select Comfort sleep number bed number since..... you never sleep
- Have superhuman strength and speed*
- Staying out of the sun leaves them wrinkle-free for life.
- High protein, low fat diet *
- Werewolves get to eat muffins. Seriously—there is a scene in Twilight New Moon, where a bunch werewolves are just sitting around eating corn muffins. Nice.

CONS:

- Terrible life if you were a foodie, chef, or food critic before becoming a vampire. Your diet consists of blood and...... well...blood.
- Immortality (yes, this is a pro and a con—how would you like seeing everyone you love die before you?)
- Pastey white complexion makes it difficult to "hit the beach" during the summer months ^
- Have to wait for capes to become fashionable again.
- Werewolves always have to carry around lint rollers with them because of wolf hair

Just some observations. What are yours?

It's 5:30 a.m. and I am off to the pool to go swimming for an hour followed by a 45 minute endurance run in zone 2. Roar.

More soon. Train Smart.

The Confessions

2010-12-26T21:10:00.000-05:00

Shortly after handing the no television punishment until the guilty water-in-the-soap culprit has been identified, my son Julian was the first one to confess his guilt. Julian confessed in his quiet, meek voice (not his usual voice immodulation disorder voice). For some reason, all of our children suffer from what my wife and I have determined to be temporary hearing loss. We have come to this conclusion because all of our children have at some point stood less than three feet away from us while speaking in a manner that resembles a PA system. Seriously, what is up with our children? Is their self-awareness so poor that they do not understand that they are shouting at us from across a table at dinner? But I digress.

The conversation went down like this:

Julian: "Mommy... I did it. I put the water in the soap."

Mommy: "You did? When did you do it?"

Julian: "Um..... sometime, like a couple of weeks ago."

Mommy: "No Julian, this was more recently. This must have happened in the last couple of days."

Julian: "Well, I don't know. I think... um.... maybe... it was like a couple of days ago."

Mommy: "Uh-huh."

Then it was Janina's turn to confess—followed by Luca—who literally said that he did it sometime "last year." It did not take us more than five seconds to realize what was going on. Our kids will confess to grand larceny if it means having their coveted television time back. We never found out who did it... but I have a sneaking suspicion it may have been Thing 1 or Thing 2.

Christmas morning was great fun. The bambini were up at the butt crack of dawn. This is not unusual. Wifey always makes fun of the fact that I do not know how—or do not care to take the time—to wrap Christmas presents. So, I always like to exaggerate the fact that I can not wrap a present to save my life. I get a bit campy with the high school-esque adoration. Can any men really wrap presents? I have not met one yet. Rumor has it that one lives in a forest with elves among the unicorns and dragons.

My Russian children.

Julian deciding to have some of my vino on his birthday. (Christmas Eve)

Training:

SWIMMING: I can not believe I am saying this, but I am still very much enjoying the swimming. Maybe when I am about a month and a half out from my first HIM in June, I will reconsider my feelings toward swimming, but right now, it has been my favorite workout. In fact, Coach Mary gave me a long swim workout that I was not suppose to get done in an hour, but I managed to just make it in 59:58! I can not wait to see what she throws my way this week.

RUNNING: I had a great endurance run yesterday. It was the first time I ran outside in weeks. Coach Mary had me run 45 minutes (Merry Christmas) in zone 2. The weather yesterday was a balmy 21 degrees. When I got out initially, I was a bit cold. I wore tights, my Rev3 Cedar Point Finisher shirt as my base layer and a cold weather shirt. In about five minutes, I was nice and comfortable. The cold weather helped keep my heart rate down as well.
I get to go out New Years Day and run a 7.5 miler—as fast as I can. So, New Years Race Report to follow soon. I am a bit nervous about doing a race since I have been doing nothing more than zone 2 training the last couple of weeks. Heck, who am I kidding? It will be great fun to motor.

BIKING: The thing with biking during the winter, is that I have to get on my bike in the basement and be bored to tears. Honestly, I would rather look at the black line on the bottom of a pool then sit on a trainer for an hour. So, I have been downloading movies to keep me from clock-watching. So far, I have watched the first two Harry Potter movies while on the trainer with the boys. I have another week of base work until the real joy starts. Coach Mary said not to worry about these little zone 2 rides, because she will have me "puking over my front tire in no time." Ah, it is that kind of sadistic personality that I find especially heart warming in my coach this time of year!

More soon. Train Smart!

The Inquisition

2010-12-21T23:07:00.004-05:00

Recently, an inquisition ensued at my house that made the whole Spanish one look like a tiny religious squabble.

When you have five children all under the age of eight, and someone or something is:

a) broken
b) missing
c) hurt by "mysterious" circumstances

our house conducts a special United States Senate Subcommittee Investigation into what may have initiated said incident. This is how it went down:

I was in my basement doing a one hour trainer ride, when all of a sudden from upstairs I hear wifey in a VERY loud voice ask "Who put water in the soap?"

SILENCE

Seconds later... "Who put water in the soap?"

SILENCE AGAIN

Now, I should preface that putting water in the soap dispenser is a very small problem. It is a very small problem if it happens once. After four or five times without the apprehension of a suspect, the Chief of Police at my house (wifey) has had just about enough. You see, as wifey likes to explain to me—because I often need explaining—soap is expensive. And because we like to live life green, wifey buys soap that is good for the environment. This soap happens to be a little pricer than most normal,"continue to kill our planet" varieties. As an aside, I should tell you that for some reason little girls particularly enjoy dispensing soap and rubbing it all over the sink in the bathroom, on the vanity, countertops, (you get the idea). Even at the local YMCA, my girls can not help themselves with the bubbly hand sanitizer. Perhaps the little ladies have some sort of unhealthy tactile fascination with the slippery stuff, but they just can not seem to leave the stuff alone. I am suddenly imagining stumbling upon an incriminating picture of my girls years from now on Facebook on spring break somewhere—unbeknownst to wifey and I—at one of those cheesy, touristy bars with a soap machine, getting lathered up while drinking cheap swill that the natives likes to pass as beer. Wonderful! Moving on....

My wife calls all of them into the living room at which time she starts her diatribe about the cost of soap, how hard mommy and daddy work to buy things, and even the obligatory "... and shut the lights out when you leave your room. Don't you know we don't own the electric company?" As a child, I always found this a bit odd. Even if you did own the electric company, wouldn't you still have to pay for the service provided? But I digress.

The response: Five little round faces with cherub-like gazes looked back at my wife with nothing but innocence and astonishment. First—how does this witch know I put water in the soap. Secondly, what will the punishment be if I should come forward and admit to this heinous, vile, insolent act?!
So, we sat around for five minutes waiting for someone to confess. Nothing. So, wifey decided to play hardball. "Okay—no t.v. or movies until the person who did admits to it." Still nothing. We got some shifty eyes from the twins. Very shifty. So, we can not p unish everyone indefinitely, but they will have to go without their coveted Scooby Doo and Dora the Explorer until Christmas morning—which might as well be an eternity for them. We've been doing a tad more reading around the ole' house this week.

Speaking of reading, Luca and I are now on book 3 of the Harry Potter series. We are reading them together. They are a fantastic read for both him and me. I realized something about reading books to my children. My philosophy with toys has always been:

If I am going to sit down and play with toys for hours with my children, it better be something that I actually want to play as well. That is why Luca and Julian are into building lego models. I love building Legos with the boys. I actually think Legos are one of the coolest toys in the galaxy. Julian will literally spend hours building Lego models following, what he refers to as "the map." So, Harry Potter is fun to read because it is well written. If I have to read one more Berstein Bear, or Arthur book I think I may just go crazy.

We took my wifey's parents out for dinner on Friday. They sure do a lot for us. With five kids, they were our primary source of childcare this past semester, year, lifetime... as wifey and I were busy with some professional obligations. We would never be able to swing it if it were not for them and the help of family and friends. Here are a few of the delicious eats we had with explanations. Try not to drool:

Oysters on the half shell

Rock shrimp and calamari in deliciousness with daikon radish and field greens

Wifey's tina roll

The Vino

I am not that evil, so I will not post the main courses, but they were might yummy!

Oh yeah... TRAINING:

I could not be happier with my progress thus far. I feel fit, and ready to go. The bikes are a little behind where I would like them right now. I am just starting to get into the swing of biking again and my legs are asking the rest of my body what the hell is going on. Nothing like being in your basement on a trainer for the remainder of the winter. And, luckily for me, winter in western New York is only a mere 9 months long! Coach Mary has me training to keep my HR in zone 2 on my runs and bike. I am finding it extremely difficult on my runs because of my ego, and because I am not incredibly patient. I mean, what the heck do I do on my runs? Walk?? So, this week has me doing endurance runs no longer than an hour.

I am currently in love with swimming. What the heck?!!! I have been doing these great swim workouts that I am really excited about. Essentially, Coach Mary is giving me swims that are far beyond what I can do in an hour. There is something really liberating about knowing that I can not get it done. For some reason, when the pressure is off to motor, it happens anyway.

I think I am going to do a 7.5 mile race on New Year's morning (pending Coach Mary's approval). I am alaso looking forward to doing a "location run" when I head out to Seattle the beginning of January to hear the premiere of my new piece "Chromium Music" by The Tangletown Trio. Word on the street is that there are some awesome places for seafood in the Pacific Northwest. You don't say?

More soon. Train Smart!

I Wish I Had Gills

2010-12-15T15:32:00.001-05:00

I wish I had gills. Although, I am not sure that it would really help much.

This week marked the beginning of my Ironman base training with Coach Mary. Coach Mary coaches a lot of athletes, but somehow she gives the personal attention that makes you think she has a camera set up in my house and is aware of each time I delve into"slacker mode." She is already on me like white on rice. I rather like this. I mean, this is why I wanted a coach this season. I have quickly learned that when you have a coach, there is no such thing as not logging your workouts.

I took my swim test yesterday. This included a moderate length warm up, followed by the yardage to find my 100 pace. My warmup felt great, maybe too great. By the time I got to my pace set, I was a little tired already. I think part of this is that I am still going to bed too late. I have to work on this. Needless to say, my 100 pace is NOT terribly fast. The good news is that Coach Mary is a swimmer, and if anyone can help me with an analysis of my swim, she can. She makes Aquaman look like a chump (or so I've been told). What is the deal with Aquaman exactly. I mean... honestly, there is no Aquawoman. Doesn't he get a tad lonely down there in the eerie green deep with all of those prehistoric looking sea creatures?

Training thus far is going relatively well. I dig training when I have specific goals. It was weird just jumping into the pool and going out for a run without any real specific plan. I have been noticing a familiar sensation that usually accompanies my workouts: hunger. Yeah, I am pretty much extremely hungry all day. I joke, but one of the reasons I love training this hard is that I can consume as much food as some of those on the competitive eating tours. Honestly, I am not proud of this fact, but I can pack away a pound or pasta in one sitting.

I have some exciting news about some of the sponsors for Team Trakkers this upcoming season.

Kestrel will be the official bike sponsor of Team Trakkers for the 2011 season. Yes, this means I will be rocking a brand new bike this summer. Will it be this one pictured here? No. This bike is far too small for me. I mean, even on the largest computer screen, this bike would only measures four or five inches long.

Seriously, I am figuring out what bike and component group to go with. Any suggestions? Just go to the Kestrel website and pick out a bike for me. Maybe I should put an online poll up. I could also have a donation page for anyone wanting to fuel my lifestyle. Nah—just kidding. I will be selling my ole' trusty steed to one deserving triathlete. I shall miss you Cookie Monster. We had some good times. Thanks for getting me through Rev3 Cedar Point. I shall miss you.

Avia is the official shoe sponsor of Trakkers. Although I have never worn Avia's, I have heard good things about them from a number of athletes. How cool is it that their racing flat comes in Trakkers green
and black

I am really excited to report that the official nutrition sponsor of the Trakkers team is First Endurance. I am really excited because most of my training partners from this past season got on board with First Endurance with me. So, I know it is going to be really easy to promote their awesome products.

I will be posting some lengthy reviews of my gear once I get underway with all of it.

Okay, I am off. I have an hour bike ride tonight. I will probably watch an episode of Iron Chef while I am on my trainer. Iron Chef is the greatest cooking show on the planet. Two chefs go head to head to create culinary masterpieces with a single featured ingredient as the main focus of a dish. So, they will have these chefs making four to six different courses with things like broccoli, herring, kobe beef, and mushrooms as their featured ingredient. I think I dig this show because I am a composer. Composition is just like cooking when you get down to it. It is all about different colors, texture, presentation.

Training: Coach Mary gave me a swim workout for tomorrow that reads: Do as much as you can in the time allotted. Huh? As much as I can in an hour? Clearly, she is trying to drown me. More soon. Train smart!

GOING GREEN!

2010-12-08T23:20:00.001-05:00

I'M GOING GREEN!

I already knew I led an incredibly blessed life, but it is always amazing when life throws you a special bonus. This afternoon I learned that I would be joining an amazing team this summer, as I was selected for the 2011 Trakkers team. I will be joining some of my longtime blogger buddies Kelly, Anne, Jeff, and Mandy to name but a few, as well as meeting and introducing all of you to my many new awesoime team members. If any of you have done a Rev 3 event, you know how encouraging and accessible the Trakkers team is.

I have to admit, I NEVER thought when I set out to do my first triathlon four short seasons ago that it would become a lifestyle.

Training: I have had to switch a few of my workouts around, but I am getting in all the volume. I will have to talk to coach Mary at some point.. like, soon... to find out if this is actually okay. I missed my swim/run yesterday, so I did it today as well as the 30 minute bike. It is painful doing 30-minute bike rides, but coach Mary insists that six months from now when I am doing six hour rides I will not be complaining about increasing my bike volume. Hey, I did a triathlon today—wahoo!

Rainbows And Hogwarts Therapy

2010-12-08T11:22:00.003-05:00

I'm alive—really! As the semester comes to a quick end, I am consumed by things such as grading, finishing a new composition, and fielding questions from students who feel like their various degrees of procrastination throughout the semester has suddenly constituted some type of emergency on my part. How does that work exactly? Okay, I must admit, I often resembled that student while I was an undergraduate. It took me a bit of time to figure out how to manage my life. Of course, my wife would insist that if it were not for her, I would be unable to pay bills, wash dishes, fold laundry, and make the bed. She knows ~~the~~ ~~correc~~t her way of doing things. Seriously, I know I am not going to get any sympathy here, especially from my female friends who probably understand the dynamics of my relationship with the wifey and understand that if it were not for her, I would not be able to tie my shoes before leaving the house in the morning.

In any event, my Thanksgiving tryptophan hibernation is slowly wearing off following my Thanksgiving Day feast, and as I promise yet again never to eat my weight in apple pie over the course of a weekend, I look forward to doing so every year around Thanksgiving time.

I had a great Thanksgiving weekend. Vanessa came home for the holiday and we had a chance to talk running, triathlon, beer, music, medieval stuff that I do not really understand, but I shook my head up and down and furrowed my eyebrows to pretend to know what she was talking about. Every once in a while, I would work in the occasional chin rub to add to the faux-illuminati experience.

Last Monday was my first day of training with coach Mary. My first week has been pretty tame—nothing over a one hour workout. I am back into the swing of running. Unfortunately, the end of my semester has been frantic—to say the least—and I have already missed a couple of workouts. I have not had the energy (I can always make time) to get up early and get out the door. More, because the weather has been yucky, I have had to stay overnight a few days and it just messes up my training rhythm. Ugh!

Here are some things I definitely know now that I am older and wiser:

1) The mental fatigue that results of having far too much on the burner at any moment (and trying to perform it all exceptionally well, usually gives way to physical exhaustion. This manifests with less mental acuity needed for my workouts. My muggle friends (i.e. those who do not partake in triathlon) think that running, biking—or dare I say this—swimming for an HOUR is merely a physical act. On the contrary, you need to be mentally connected to your workouts. If you are mentally wiped, chances are your workouts will not be as effective as they could be with proper rest and peace of mind.

The best way to combat this for me is to do my workouts early in the morning. That way, it is out of the way and I am not getting stressed about when I am going to fit my workouts in.

2) I started reading the first Harry Potter book with my oldest son, Luca. Why I have not read these books yet is beyond me. They are well written. My son asks to read the books with him on the weekend rather than watch a movie with siblings—very cool! I also find getting lost in the fantasy world of Hogwarts for a half an hour a night with my boys very therapeutic.

3) Hydration is important. Duh. For some reason, as the winter months roll in—and those of you living south of the Monongahela line, do not even pretend to know what I am talking about—I forget to hydrate. Sure, you warm blooded creatures get the occasional cold day, even week, but you can not possibly understand what it is like for us poor, wretched souls, stuck up in western New York that are pounded all winter long by the unrelenting white stuff. Anyway, more hydration is in order for the remaining winter.

I am just starting to get in the flow of stuff. Although, with the end of the semester quickly approaching and final grades looming in my not-too-distant future, I am still up to my earlobes.

I will get in a workout here in just a few minutes. I am walking up to the pool to get some much needed therapy.

More soon. Train Smart!

Getting Itchy And Spoiled Milk

2010-11-25T15:17:00.001-05:00

Oh my gosh—I feel like a little kid waiting for Santa—WHO IS REAL by the way—as I eagerly await my first week of training from Coach Mary. Seriously, I have not been this excited to train since..... well.... I have never been this excited to start training.

I have been feeling a bit under the weather this whole week, but I was committed to getting out there this morning with my longtime running buddy, Vanessa for the annual turkey day 10k. To say I did not feel one hundred percent would be an unbelievable understatement. My right hip is still acting goofy, but I think I have figured out the culprit. Ready for this? I think that it is a combination of my leather belt that I wear sitting all day and sitting with my right leg crossed over my left for large parts of my day. How do I know this? I tried crossing my right leg over my left and it hurt like heck. Of course, I was not satisfied that this could really be what has been causing my body great pain, so I had to try it over and over. I felt like the guy that opens up a milk carton and tells his roommate "Oh my gosh! This smells terrible! Smell it!" What is that about? I am pretty sure I can take someone's word for it when they say the milk is spoiled.

Anyway, I felt like I have not been training when I was out there on my run this morning. I started out too fast and got progressively slower. Oops. Basically, today was a training day. I have that ickiness that comes from congestion, and my body is still fatigued. I am sure that if I just laid in bed for a couple of days drinking orange juice and and taking over the counter medication, I would convalesce back to my former feeling of immortality. So why am I running, biking and swimming under less than ideal health conditions? For a succinct, but thorough explanation of this see my friend Kelly's post from this week.

Here is how my day went down (yuck):

Yeah, that last mile really did not go down the way I wanted it too. To tell you the truth, my race was over at mile three. My legs felt great going up the gradual hills, but my wind was non-existent, and my hip started felling naughty.

The good news? My buddy Vanessa PR'ed by over a minute with a 44:50(ish)! Nice job little buddy!

Congratulations to all my running buddies out there today. Seriously, I saw no fewer than 40 athletes I know. It is so fun seeing people of all different ages out there getting in their pre-Thanksgiving Day guilt run.

My boys are now very interested in tracking their running as they have watchd me upload my runs onto my computer. So:

Julian's run: Luca's run:

Stay tuned all spring and summer to see how much more prepared for Ironman my sons are than me.

Happy Thanksgiving! Train Smart!