My new wetsuit

Don't laugh, but I have a huge fear of jelly fish. I'm fine training in water around here with high levels of E-Coli, but those little buggers aren't fun and that's one thing that scares the pants off of me about the Ironman Florida swim. Although I knew I'd be doing the race in a wetsuit for obvious reasons, I only had a sleeveless suit and that leaves a lot of attackable (yes that's a word) skin. Not to mention the fact that I need all the help I can get to be faster, so I started looking into a full suit kind of half-heartedly.

Tom got an email the other day for 50% off XTerra Vortex 2 full suits. Don't know if the sale is still going on, but you just have to enter XX50 when you add it to the cart. Sweeeeeeet!

So we ordered them and got a great deal- originally $398 a piece, got them for 50% off. It arrived yesterday. OH.... MY.... GAWD! The thing weighs a ton, but it's like I'm going to be wrapped in a floaty. These babies are the real thing!!! I'm so excited to try it out, although I'm going to have to wait a bit as I was nearly sweating during my swim yesterday without a wetsuit on.

And the best part - those jelly fish aren't going to have anything on me!

I PRed!!!

I'm so excited. One of my goals for 2008 was to run a sub 2:00 half marathon. In March we did a half and according to the race clock, I came in t 2:00:20-something. According to our Garmin, it was 1:59:00-ish. I couldn't really count that as a sub 2:00 because in the books it shows me being over 2:00. So this weekend we signed up fora race called Dash for Donations (it's a charity run benefiting Life Line of Ohio organ and tissue donation). It was sort of a last minute sign up since we decided to do it on Thursday and the race was Saturday.

I get to the race feeling good and take off at a good pace. Tom has the Garmin and says that I need to maintain 9:09's to beat my 2:00 time goal. At mile 3, we were averaging 8:53's. He told me that I'd not be able to maintain that if I wasn't careful and that maybe at mile 6 we should pull it in a bit. But I felt so good... so I didn't and I'm glad that I didn't.

We both finished in 1:55:29 (1:56:38 clock time), a pace of 8:49/mile! I'm so excited. I PRed by 4 minutes and Tom PRed by about a 2 minutes. I felt so comfortable through the whole thing and know that the training is paying off!

Here are my splits:
Mile 1: 8:57
Mile 2: 8:39
Mile 3: 8:53
Mile 4: 8:44
Mile 5: 9:03
Mile 6: 8:56
Mile 7: 8:37
Mile 8: 8:52
Mile 9: 8:46
Mile 10: 8:54
Mile 11: 8:47
Mile 12: 8:55
Mile 13: 8:36
Last 0.1: 0:49

So of course we head off to Amish country to a breakfast buffet (well Tom ate that, I indulged in an egg sandwich and a giant cinnamon roll). You gotta reward yourself for a job well done right? And then in true Ironman training fashion, I biked 70 miles yesterday.

By the way - check out the countdown clock to Florida - it's in the 90 day range. Uh oh!

Ignorance drives me nuts!

*** EDITED BELOW BY AUTHOR***

As the wife of a type 1 diabetic, I am continually amazed by the ignorance and stupidity of people. My husband was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at the age of 28. No, he's not over weight. No, he's not unhealthy. Those are the first two things that people assume when they hear that he's a diabetic. See, there's 2 kinds of diabetes - the unhealthy kind and the unlucky kind. My husband has the unlucky kind. I'll explain...

Type 1 diabetics are insulin dependant. Many people used to think that only young kids get it (it's sometimes called Juvenile Diabetes), but the trend is changing that anyone can get it at any time. At some point in their life, their pancreas dies and they can no longer deliver sugar to organs (the role of insulin). Many times there is nothing in particular that brings the disease on - much like in the case with Tom. He was a football player through college, had already run a handful of marathons, was actively involved in triathlons, had a single digit body fat % and was in phenomenal physical health when he was diagnosed. They don't know what brought it on, but he's going to live with it for the rest of his life. He gives himself 5 or so shots a day, pricks his finger 10 or so times a day and LIVES with the disease. Since he didn't do anything to bring it on and can't change the diagnosis, he has the unlucky kind.

Type 2 diabetics generally have a hard time producing insulin, although their pancreas isn't dead. Many times the disease is brought on by an inactive lifestyle, a generally unhealthy weight, poor eating habits, etc. By changing their diets, incorporating exercise and possibly taking a pill by mouth once a day, they have the chance to reverse their diagnosis and overcome the disease. This is what we call the unhealthy kind of diabetic, although they CAN change the diagnosis.

So with that being said... why can't people just try to think before they speak. We once had someone said "Until I met Tom, I never felt sorry for diabetics because I figured they brought the disease on themselves". Tom is working on a fundraising project which involves bracelets that say "Running On Insulin" (that happens to be Tom's motto, his website and a team that he's forming). He was on the phone with the company today that's making the bracelets and was deciding what size he should order for the 1000 bracelets that he'll be getting. He knew that he'd like to have some for everyone. The lady from the company said "well since they are for diabetics, you should probably get all of them in size large."

Really lady? That's what you think, that all diabetics are fat? Well this guy has diabetes:

So do these guys: This whole team has diabetes, oh and they have won RAAM twice against non-diabetic riders (and as an added bonus, my hubby is a member of this team, although the Team Type 1 Triathlon team).And this is my favorites Type 1 Diabetic:

Maybe she needs a bracelet ... and a good smack upside the head!

***Edit added 7/26 - I've had a few people tell me that I'm wrong in what I wrote about Type 2 diabetics and I want to clear some things up. First, I never said that EVERY overweight person has type 2 or that EVERY type 2 is overweight. I said that generally that's the trend. I stand by that, even after learning that 20% of Type 2's are of normal weight. I guess there's a discrepency as to when "generally" can be used - 80% seems to be a fair number, but maybe I'm wrong. I also mispoke when I wrote that type 2 diabetics CAN reverse their diagnosis. There is a number of them that can't because they fall into that category of being healthy with a genetic makeup for Type 2, older people, etc. So I just wanted to clear that up. I wasn't 100% wrong in my statements that I made here and quite frankly learned something as well which I will always admit. I have now been educated on something I made an assumption on and apologize.

Quick Race Report

We did another OLY yesterday and quite frankly it was fairly uneventful so I won't post a huge race report. Tom and I were both going back and forth with the "do you even want to do the race" conversations all week so getting through it was good enough for me! Here are the abbreviated highlights to an overall good race

• The swim - not wetsuit legal. Ugh... and I say that because we haven't been swimming much, just doing drills with the TI tapes and I feel like I'm relearning swimming again so I was hoping to at least have the help of the wetsuit. I was totally uncomfortable with the swim which can be seen in the ridiculously slow time of 35:16 that it took me to finish. Oh, and the anti-fog solution that Tom used on my goggles was worthless. I could go on and on but I wouldn't bring you down!
• Run 1 (yes, this actually came before T1 - there was a run segment from the lake, up a hill, to T1). That took me 1:25 (although I'm glad that I didn't have to run it in my wetsuit)
• T1 - nothing special. I went to the wrong side of my rack and then had to climb under it to get my bike and gear. I'm a moron sometimes! T1 time was 1:08 which I liked seeing.
• Bike - the bike is 5 laps, half of each lap being done on a highway. It's nice because you can usually gain some speed on the entrance ramp to the highway, although each lap got progressively more windy. I could really feel myself pushing into the wind with the harder gears trying to keep a good steady pace and by lap 3, my IT was starting to hurt. If this was my last race, I would have just said "Screw it", but I have a long season ahead of me and I didn't want to risk more injury. I pulled back a little and averaged 20.64mph for the whole ride. Time - 1:12:06 (3rd fastest in my AG)
• T2 was a lot like T1 - just went through the motions. I was in and out in 1:22
• Run - I actually felt great. Ran a 8:48 pace and finished in 54:34. Was thrilled with that and happy that I pulled back a bit on the bike because the IT didn't bother me at all on the run.
• Overall, I finished in 2:45:51, 6th in my AG and 83rd of 159 overall. I'll take it.
• They took pictures and I will post them when I finally see them!

That's was the extent of my workouts though for the weekend. I think we're going to be pushing it hard this week though! :)

Congrats to all of you who finished Lake Placid yesterday. I was following quite a few people all day and happy to see everyone had finished. I'm anxious to hear how your individual races went! I know that the rain probably made it interesting! :)

Envy

Envy (noun) : a feeling of grudging admiration and desire to have something possessed by another.

I have envy. I'm envious. More specifically, I have sponsor envy.

It's a problem. I'm trying to deal with it. I'm trying to hide it. But I can't.

The hubby got his Team Type 1 race kit today. This was the second box of goodies that he's received from TT1. The first kit included 2 pairs of bike shorts, 2 bike jerseys, a jacket, a polo, and socks. Todays packet included a pair of tri shorts, a tri top, a tri suit, a vest, a windbreaker, a winter coat, arm warmers, a visor, a hat and another polo. Now granted he has to be a diabetic to get these things, but I want them. I want someone to send me free clothes. I could use free clothes.

I need a team (maybe I just want a team!). That's a lot harder than it sounds. I've applied to be on Team Bare Naked. They haven't responded. Last year I tried to be on Team Goody Stay Put. They didn't like me. Tom has found 5 or so teams that I should apply for -

1. Team Timex (which all happen to be pros so that's out)
2. Team Zoot/Gu (except I can't stomach a gu if my life depended on it... I'd be a great spokesperson for them, huh!)
3. Team Terry (there are only 5 women on this team and they all live in the Eastern states)
4. Team TriBar (they are organic and Vegan and well, I eat meat and animal products)
5. Team Java Republic (I don't drink coffee)

Maybe I should start my own team. It could be the Average Triathletes that just like to have fun Team. Anyone wanna join? We could get clothes and hats and socks and stuff. I could send them to your house in big boxes. I would make it known that you were special. Then maybe your spouse could have sponsor envy too! :)

Whew... glad that's over!

We set out for a 100 miler this weekend to check a race course that we're looking into. The website said that it's "challenging for riders of all abilities" and since we're planning on doing the half IM distance, I wanted to make sure that I wasn't going to die. This is the same race company that is slightly confused on what flat means.

So Saturday we get everything packed, drive about 15 minutes to a park where we're going to start from. It's hot. It's sunny. It's going to be a good day. We start biking and "Whoa! Where did that wind come from". Of course it was coming from the west and we're heading straight into the west. Within about 5 mile the sky turned BLACK. Where we ride, it's just corn fields and farms (yeah, keep your Ohio jokes to yourselves!) and we both joked that we'd see a twister any minute. We kept pushing on. We got about 18 miles into the ride after fighting a wall of wind and it started pouring. We went back and forth with the "do we continue and hope it blows over" conversation and finally decided for our safety, we better head back. Bummer. We got 36 miles in or something. By the time we got home, unloaded the bikes and showered, it was sunny as could be. Arg.... too late to go back out. So we laid around, cleaned the bikes and decided to get a run in and try to 100 the next day. We left for the run at 5:30pm and it was probably 85 degrees with the typical gazillion percent humidity that's normal in Ohio after a day of rain. We will never learn!

Our 8 mile run went well - kept a 9:01 pace for the whole thing but we were both wiped out when we got home. Decided an ice bath would be good for us. OH... MY... GAWD! Brought back memories from college when I got injured in soccer that I never wanted to relive!

Sunday we got up to a rainy day, although we knew that it was supposed to pass. Tom, his mom and I decided to go for it. We loaded the bikes and by the time we left, the sky was clearing. Back to the park 15 miles away. Get on the bikes and "hello wind... it's nice to see you again!" Like another brick wall still coming from the west. I knew it was going to be a long ride. About 30 miles into it the hills hit. Now I know I usually talk about how flat Ohio is, but I'm convinced that it's only Columbus that's flat. These were some monster climbs. The race route (we rode the course backwards for about 20 miles) was a biotch! We kept saying it was because we had ridden 50 miles already into the wind, but it's not going to be an easy race! Somehow, the ride home was just as windy. We thought for sure we'd fly home, but alas - the wind shifted! So we pushed... a lot. I felt it in my IT. I got fried because I thought it was going to be cloudy and well, it wasn't. I was tried because of pushing the run the night before. But, we did it! The first century of the season and I was so happy to see 100.00 click over on my bike. I probably could have kept going, but we're not going to say that out loud!

I did come to a conclusion though - I will never do Lake Placid. I do not like hills. They do not like me. And cut me some slack mother nature. Wind both directions - really? Was that necessary?

Guess I have to work to be an Iron Diva! :)

WW, Yassos and TI, Oh my

Nice title huh? I'm so original!

First, I hit lifetime membership status at weight watchers (that just means that I hit goal, went through 6 weeks of maintenance and now don't have to pay any time that I go. I just have to weight in once a month and be within 2 pounds of my goal!) That's awesome. And I'm sure the celebratory mini burgers and shoestrings fries will definitely keep me right where I need to be! (Oh... and the burgers were AWESOME in case you were wondering!)

Second - we did Yasso 800's this morning. It's great because we can do them right along the water at our local lake and then get in the water and do our swimming when we are done. We realized that we were doing them wrong in the past - I guess you're supposed to jog for your recovery and not stand there like a boob and wonder why they aren't that bad. Yeah, definitely a little harder! I kept them around 3:45/800 though which was nice. Tom wants to do 10 next week. He's nuts though so I guess that shouldn't surprise me.

Third, I'm aspiring to be a Girl of TI (ha... it would have worked but they are actually called the Sirens of TI now - Vegas reference for all of you non-Vegasy people). Anyway, I'm not going to be dressed like a wench, swinging from a pirate ship on nights when it's not too windy. Instead I'm using Total Immersion swimming (hence the girl of TI - that was pretty bad huh?) Anyway, we decided to get the video and give it a try. We've been doing the drills for a week now - learning how to balance, find our sweet spot, fish, zipper, switch and all that other stuff. We'll see how it works when I put it all together (that's drill 14 and we're on drill 7 so maybe by next week I'll be swimming again). They swear that their product works or they give your money back so I'm hoping that I gain a little bit of energy and maybe some time in the water. It's a weak spot for me right now.

Forth, I'm looking more into my nutrition for the Ironman. I've already made an Infinite Nutrition formula (DH uses it - they actually were a sponsor of his last year, but I digress), but I need some help. I'm a salty athlete - like when I'm done they should just lay me on my side and the deer could all come and lick me for days on end. Any other products (like nuun, saltstick, etc) that any of you have used and had success with? I'm open to try just about anything.

Finally, here are some pictures from the race two weeks ago that they just posted on the race site. Enjoy and have a great week!

A busy week

Last week came and went. That's about all I remember of it. It seems like I wake up one day and I blink and the day is over. I guess that's what I get for keeping so busy. I thought that maybe after I got married, life would slow down yet it feels like just yesterday I was walking down the aisle. Does time ever slow down? Probably when I least expect (or want it to).

Speaking of my wedding, Tom and I got married 3 years ago last Thursday. We had a great anniversary - just hung out, made a nice dinner, enjoyed each others company, yada yada yada. Being the little homemaker that I am, I decided to try to recreate our wedding cake for our anniversary. Long story short, for those of you who weren't at our wedding, we didn't do a traditional wedding cake. Instead, we did individual cakes on each table which served as centerpieces, with a knife and cake server so that people could help themselves and have a good size piece of cake. I always find it so disappointing at weddings when the bride and groom have a gorgeous cake and we are served a sliver the thickness of paper. Cake truly is one of the best parts as a wedding guest and they always tempt you and leave you wanting more, but never able to have anything else. I didn't want to do that to my guests... I didn't want them temped by a bite and then yearning for more, only to get the shaft by the servers at the reception who cut the cake in the back so small so that they have huge chunks left over for themselves - and don't tell me that's not what happens... I'm convinced! Anyway, so our actual cakes looked like this. They came from the local grocery store and when we bought them 3 years ago they were all of $17 a piece. I went to the store to have them recreate it for Thursday and they were going to charge me $45. Right... for a cake. One layer... 8"... I was going to pay for the flowers on top. I decided they sucked for trying to rip me off, left in a huff and went to Michael's, bought an icing bag and basket weave tip and had at it in the privacy of my own kitchen. I also made the cake to my liking, aka weight watcher friendly. It was a diet coke cake (a can of diet coke and a box of devil's food cake mix, baked like a normal cake - you'd never know the difference - let me know if you want more info!), topped with sugar free pudding/cool whip topping so that you don't feel like a boob ruining your diet to splurge (and so the hubby can eat it too and not go into a sugar coma or have to drink a bottle of insulin). I will never eat a Giant Eagle cake again. They suck. That's all there is to it. Mine turned out fairly well if you ask me (and no, there isn't any left!)

Of course the real thing looked just a tad better, but whatever. I know it didn't taste as good as mine! :) And yes, from now on, anytime someone askes me to make a cake for something, you're getting a basket weave cake made with love!

Training was good this weekend too. We had such a long week last week - Monday we took the day off, but then had 2 hour workouts almost every day throughout the week. I knew that we had a long weekend ahead of us too but felt like I was rested and ready. Friday we did a 10 miler in the rain. It was a great run - there's something about running in the rain that's just calming... reminds me of childhood or something and helps keep my mind off of the task at hand. I felt great right out of the gate knew the first mile was probably a bit fast. Tom said to me "you aren't going to be able to keep this pace for more than 6 miles, that's my prediction". I proved him wrong, running 10 miles in 1:30:01 and our last mile was an 8:13 to boot. We averaged 9:00/miles and I actually felt like I could run all day. It was a nice change from how I've been feeling lately. Yesterday we biked from Ostrander to Prospect, then to Delaware, then to Gahanna to my mom and dad's. They had come up Friday and took our car home with them so we had to get to their house yesterday. We had a great 65 mile ride, again feeling like I could go forever. I know that my recovery is working well to feel that fresh after a long week. This coming week will be another good test as we have 16 hours and 40 minutes scheduled, and that's without lifting. I am going to be one with the water, my bike and my running shoes this week! :)

The holiday was great. Saw the fam on Friday and Saturday, saw Tom's family for just a bit yesterday and then today relaxed, knowing that it's going to be a busy week ahead of us. Maybe this week won't go by as fast as last week. It's gotta slow down eventually right? Maybe I shouldn't wish that yet...