Trail Maintenance

This morning a bunch of locals helped clean up the Carlsbad trails. We don't get much rain in Southern CA, but when we do it erodes our trails a lot. 

Dean, Corky and I picked, shoveled and moved big rocks, along with about 100 other local outdoor enthusiasts. I was impressed how many people showed up.

My friend in London sent some awesome snacks that helped keep me going. THANK YOU!!

Overall, a good start to a beautiful weekend!

Ouch

I lost my arms in the Carlsbad pool this morning. Not sure what happened, but they just fell right off. Thankfully Marit was there to drag me through the remainder of the workout and make me laugh!

Then at lunch I went out to ride and lost my legs as well. I was happy the legs stayed in tact to get my heart rate where I wanted four times before they decided to leave me. I would like to remove the stoplights from my route as well. If anyone knows how I might do this it would be helpful. They are messing up my little Pikes Peak heart rate graph.

Since I lost both arms and both legs this did not leave me with much else to work with. My head was still attached so I decided to come back to work in order to support my expensive triathlon hobby.

Life and Worms

Life isn't always fair. Herrad lives in the Netherlands. She has MS. I can't say I really understand what this is like, besides reading some of her blog posts. I can only imagine that it might completely suck at times.

I had a bike workout today that I was not exactly crazy about doing. I also had a choice as to whether or not I wanted to do it. I feel lucky to have this choice. I chose to go out and ride. I thought about Herrad as I was riding up some of the hills and it was interesting - I hit my heart rate zones and didn't really notice my legs hurting.

I forgot to bring my Shot Bloks for the ride. Thankfully, gummy worms work just as well. I recommend taking 2-3 after each hill repeat. Wash them down with water. Unfortunately, I did not bring quite enough to have 2-3 after each hill. At one point I dropped one and I'm proud to say that with limited worms in my pocket, I actually went back and got it, brushed it off, and ate it. I think it was within those "5 seconds."

If you have a free moment after your ride, run, swim, whatever-you-have-going-on today stop by Herrad's blog and leave an encouraging note. I'm sure she would appreciate it.

Breathe

This morning at masters swimming we did breathing drills. Breathe every four strokes, every six, etc. Then we played the phone number game. We did 7 x 100m with each of the 100s being a digit of your phone number for the strokes you must take before you can breathe. We quickly figured out who had the phone number with the lowest numbers in it (so we could breathe more).

For example, if someone's phone number has 9 in it - for that 100 you can only breathe every 9th stroke. (Ummmm, not going to happen!)

Our highest number was six. And I thought I might drowned.

After the phone number game we swam 5 x 200m breathing every fifth stroke. This worked well until I started to fall off the feet in front of me. Then I kicked harder, which takes more oxygen and I was sure I was going to sink to the bottom and die.

Part way through the workout though I realized I was actually gliding. Breathing less forced me to slow down, which in turn allowed me to glide! This works better than my typical arms flailing wildly to try to keep from getting dropped tactics.

Well that was FUN!

It's OPEN!! Carlsbad's Peet's Coffee & Tea opened today.

Steven and I went on a date tonight to the coffee shop, then for a walk. While walking, I realized somehow in the last few weeks spring arrived in Southern California. We went from cold rain and leafless trees to this . . . 

It was a pretty great way end to Monday.

Tour of California: Palomar

Today the Tour of California had its final stage, which included Palomar Mountain. We packed our cameras, snacks and cowbells and headed to the top.

I chalked.

Allan carried burritos up for us.

We waited.

We chased with cowbells.

How's that for a few wheels?

Levi off the front . . .

It rained briefly.

Allan was excited . . . some guy from Austin showed up.

Palomar did not disappoint. It was a great day on the mountain!

Solvang Time Trial

To get everyone even more excited (if possible) for tomorrow's Palomar climb in stage 8 of the Tour of California I have a few pictures from yesterday's time trial in Solvang.

Mr. Hincapie

Tom Boonen

Lance Armstrong sporting his sweet Livestrong aero bars.

A big thanks to my friend Jon - photographer extraordinaire!

ZERO

This was the amount of motivation I had for training this morning. I hung on at masters - barely. I had taken a few hours off work this morning to get in some extra base miles. Nothing hard, just easy miles. And I had no desire whatsoever to do any of it. I convinced myself to get on the bicycle only after promising myself a mid-ride coffee shop visit.

The bike, coffee mug and I loped down the coast to get a latte. Amazing how caffeine can motivate! On the way I was passed by two 70+ year-olds on a tandem bike. I wish I had a picture of this. It was confirmation I was not overdoing my easy base miles.

The caffeine did nothing to motivate me for my run. I pulled out the trail shoes, knowing only a trail run would bring happiness at this point. And that it did. It is caterpillar season here. I spent the entire trail run hopping over little fuzzy caterpillars, making sure not to squish them. I'm pretty sure I reverted to five years old again, and went home happy.

Ride to the end

If I was to tell this story . . .
you ride as far as you can, then hop in and swim!

Photo courtesy of Ricky David.

A Ride and a Hill

I decided to find a new hill for my bike hill repeats this week. I was hoping my problem of being unable to get my heart rate where I wanted it might be the fault of the hill rather than the cyclist. Turns out my theory was wrong.

I did six repeats and took some pictures on the top of my new hill. This one is looking out over the ocean - probably hard to see it since it blends in with the sky, but it's pretty breath-taking.

Mt. San Jacinto way off in the distance - covered in snow.

Sunday the Tour of California will climb Palomar for the first time ever. Some friends and I plan to ride our bikes up near the top to cheer. I've been looking forward to this event for months.

What's even more exciting to me is that Palomar Mountain, which is often compared to Alp d'Huez has now been categorized and it got the HC! There was speculation as to whether it would be a Cat1 climb or an HC. Of course everyone here who rides it was hoping for HC - you know, so we can all pretend we are amazing climbers like those guys in the tour!

For those of you who don't follow the Tour - HC stands for Hors Category. It is the hardest ranked hill climb and the altitude difference must be a minimum of 1000m and an average grade of 7% or more.

One fish, two fish, red fish . . . uh oh

I like our backyard because it is full of nature. We have a tiny pond with a mini waterfall and lots of neat plants that Steven keeps alive (mostly by keeping me away from them).

We have a small green frog named Henry who lives in our garden hose. When we bought the house it also came with nine orange fish in the pond.


We have a beautiful egret that enjoys visiting our backyard as well. Here is an image of our egret courtesy of Jamie Scott Lytle visiting the Batiquitos Lagoon near our house.


Last week I realized the egret does not just visit our yard so I can enjoy nature - he visits our yard for lunch! Not exactly the "set up a red-and-white-checkered picnic cloth and have a leisurely lunch" type of deal though. He comes for my fish!

I came home last week to find him chomping down on orange fish #2! He flew off to the lagoon as soon as he saw me, with his long, lean wings barely moving as he used wind currents to glide away.

I tried to run out and save orange fish #2, but I was a little too late. Since last summer we have lost eight fish to the beautiful egret!

Rest in peace little orange fishy!

500+ and TJ

Last week I topped 500 total lifetime bike commute miles. This is significant to me. Mostly because one of my original intrepidations involved the short distance of my bike commute. It seemed hard to make much of a difference by logging just under ten miles a day (when I swim). If I don't swim it's closer to five. So if I pretend gas is $2/gallon, which of course is not true in San Diego. But two is an easy multiple - that is $1,000 gas money saved already! Big bucks toward lattes, or a new bike!

[CORRECTION - apparently I need that Peet's coffee to open sooner rather than later] Thanks to Jeffrey - I now realize I have only saved $50 if my car gets 20mpg. I will keep bike commuting and have a more exciting blog post someday when I do save $1000!

I seemed to have solved most of my issues schlepping "stuff" too and from work. I asked this guy for some help and he showed me how to properly stack everything on my bike. I am so aerodynamic now it's amazing! You should also see the speed which I fly down the hill by the pool!

Carlsbad's very own Trader Joe's opened today! The only thing more exciting than this will be when Peet's coffee next door to TJ's opens in a few weeks!

Crazy Cat and Rain Fenders

I think most people with kids probably don't do "stupid-cat-tricks". We find them extremely entertaining. For example, I've taught Tiptoe to eat treats off my head. Seriously - who wouldn't want a cat that does this?!

She also helps make the bed. Well, help in the sense that when you try to put the sheets on she tries to leap through the air to tackle them. I assume she is trying to help.

Today's ride was beautiful. Last night's rain =  wet roads = wet + muddy riders. But I can't complain because the sky was blue with puffy white clouds. The ocean was sparkly and everything had that "clean" look from the rain. The poor tri bike looks just like this again.

The Mikes showed up with rain fenders on their bikes. We made fun of them until we realized they weren't getting mud all over their backsides. My only complaint of the rain fender is that it provides no benefit to the drafting rider.

The Crit

These are my rock-star friends Jenny and Crystal. They race bikes. I want to do this some day. The whole team strategy of bike racing is appealing to me. The crashing - not so much. Thankfully there was no crashing at their last race.

No joke - this is the street the crit was on.

My friend Becky and I after the race. I think we were checking out the winner, but I really have no idea. This picture cracks me up though!

Downsizing and Garden Gnomes

This morning on my bike commute it happened. I had more "stuff" than I could fit in my bike messenger bag. Oh the horror!! Somehow between swim stuff, work papers, clothes, lunch food, etc. I managed to max out the messenger bag. I had to decide between a pair of jeans and my tasty Trader Joes lunch and snacks. The food won. (I have a pair of pants I leave at work that will get worn yet again). My birthday is coming up and I have my eyes set on this fun bag. It is even green!

I love our garden. I'm not much of a gardener, thankfully Steven keeps everything alive in our yard. I'm sure it would all be dead if I was in charge. I noticed the other day we are getting our first yellow lemons of the season! I usually make some lemonade and then have no idea what to do with the rest of them. If you have any ideas I'd love to hear them. I do like the color they add to the yard.

Gerbera daisies and garden gnomes.
I'm pretty sure these two items complete any garden.

In college my friend Laura and I watched the Full Monty and ever since then I've had this thing for garden gnomes. They always make me laugh.

Enjoy the day!