Endurance Turtle A journey through this turtles triathlon adventures

Literally, I actually remembered how to ride a bike after being off of it for almost 2 months!

Yesterday, George and I FORCED ourselves to just get out and ride for an hour. It ended up being about 40 minutes, but we got out there and cleared out the ‘ol lungs. We actually decided to check out the new sharrows on Grandview, here they are in all their glory in front of Brand Park:

I actually had to reboot my phone in order to take this photo, so after George screamed up the hill he turned around and came back to where I had stopped for the photo op, here he is on his two wheeled man powered mechanism:

He was a little worried that he would forget how to balance on his bike, I found that it was hard to point out objects and such because my balance wasn’t that great….You will also note that George is pointing his finger, it is because he thinks he is #1 and I tend to agree with him.

And here is a self portrait of ME! Note the number on my helmet, didn’t realize that was there until halfway through the ride and it is from when we did the Solvang Prelude. I took it off immediately because I think it is stupid to ride around with a number on my head.

Santa also brought me what I wanted, a brand new keyboard!

I have already learned a few tunes and have been playing with it the past few days. It has all these cool settings and sounds and I know I haven’t even tapped into the possibilities that it has. But I really love it and I just need to get a bench for it.

I am off of work this week, so I would like to get some rides in before Saturday. Saturday is the Pasadena Triathlon Club “Resolution Ride”. I did this ride last year and had a lot of fun and I would like to do it again this year. I know the route so if I get left behind I can just make the most of it…which will probably happen

I hope everyone had a great Christmas! Looking forward to a great New Year!

What is a sharrow you might ask?

It’s the picture of the bike on the ground….

A sharrow is in between a bike lane and having nothing on the road to indicate cyclists might be using the paved road as well. Recently, the GREAT (insert slight sarcasm) city of Glendale California, has added these little items. Here is a link to the article on the Glendale News Press: http://www.glendalenewspress.com/articles/2009/12/16/publicsafety/gnp-sharrows121709.txt

The article is written by possibly the worst writer for a news paper that exists, but it gets the idea across.

Glendale also added a really nice bike lane to Glenoaks Ave. about a year ago, so the city is trying to do a lot for cyclists. It also helps when you have someone really pushing for cyclists rights, which we do. I have lived in this little city all my life, and I like it. I am also not one to have extreme changes in my life. The only time I have lived away from Glendale was when I was in college and spent 2 years in Downtown Los Angeles near USC and 2 years in Brentwood near UCLA. Both cities are okay, but I always get this warm and fuzzy feeling when I drive into Glendale, I know I am home.

Glendale is also notorious for having horrible drivers that do not care about anyone else in the world. I will leave it at that, because if you are a local and have been around Glendale…you know EXACTLY what I am talking about. We actually have the highest rating of pedestrian deaths because people in cars just choose to run over pedestrians instead of stopping to wait for people to cross the street. The motorists are in a hurry, they have the right away, right? (insert more sarcasm)

Will the sharrows help? I am not sure, motorists still don’t want to share the road. Are they a good effort? Absolutely! I prefer to have bike lanes, but something is better than nothing I guess and I am glad that Glendale is taking a step toward being a bike friendly neighborhood.

That’s right….after eating (what felt like) all day…I thought it would be good to spend some time on the trainer! It was only 20 minutes…but I really need to start small or else this ish is never gonna get going! I also hope you like the pink wall, this used to be my bedroom as a child and it hasn’t changed much (except for the bike instead of canopied bed now). I attempted to watch Modern Family on my computer while on the trainer but the speakers on my Mac are so crappy that I can’t hear it over the droan of the trainer. I have some computer speakers that I might move into the room…or I might just hook up the digital tuner box thingy to my old college dorm room TV and deal with it…at least I can watch the news and get excited about the Doppler 7000!

I plan to get on the bike tonight as well, even in the 20 minutes that I was on I was sweating like a little piggy and drank 3 glasses of water after I was done. So tonight, I will put a water in the water bottle holder (genius…I know) and maybe find a fan somewhere in the house and point it straight at my face! I might even wear one of those super cool 80′s headband….as I do have one from the Monster Dash 5k I did on Halloween day:

So I really hope I am turning a corner here in terms of my fitness. Not working out for a month has made me really lazy and I am noticing my energy levels are as high as a 100 year old woman. I know I have added a few pounds to the bod but I told George, I rather carry some weight through the time of year I am most likely to get sick, than to push myself and get sick and be out for a month and feel miserable. I know I can drop the weight once I get moving again and watch my diet so now I just need to get movin!

You know you are out of shape when……

You are sore from a 5k :-/

So here is my race report, late Saturday night I laid out all the clothes I was going to wear for the run. I had my base layer, some thinner running pants, my Under Armor base layer, North Face fleece pull over (that was just for wearing before the race), my PTC running shirt, PTC windbreaker, Drymax socks and an ear warmer thingy… I was prepared for temperatures to be in the 40′s and turned out the race was in the 50′s…so i was a little warm overall but I am glad that I had all that stuff on after the race when the sweat was starting to evaporate. I set my alarm to 6AM and knocked out.

Sunday morning, I finally become conscious of the time at 6:20AM….little later than I would like…my first thought is to roll over and check the weather on my phone to see if it was going to rain. If it was going to rain, I wasn’t doing it! And to be honest…I wanted it to rain…looked on my phone and no rain…clear skies ALL DAY! DAMN! Then I fought with myself and had to remember how fun races are, the crowd, the free stuff, the race itself and somehow I managed to get out of bed! It was really a painful experience but I did it and I am glad I did. Since I had laid out all my clothes it was pretty easy from there. I was on the road by 6:40 and was a little worried I wouldn’t make it in time for the 7:30AM race.

Once I got there I quickly parked and ran down to registration, as I was standing in line I was memorizing my new name and birthday (since I was given a race bib) but when I got to the front I said my new last name and got the bib no problem! I got my goodie bag then ran back up to the car to drop it off and get ready to run. I took this picture from the parking structure, unfortunately it was the only photo I got. When I plugged my phone in the night before, the wall socket fell out of the plug and my phone didn’t charge. So 1 mile into the race my phone died! Which sucks! Because there was so many cool photo opportunities along the course.

I got down to the start line and found Wedgie and his friend waiting in the coral. Because it was a small race it wasn’t that crowded and I was in a good spot. I talked with Wedgie and his friend for a bit then everyone started moving which I guess was the start of the race…no gun or horn or anything…

The first part was mostly downhill, I was a tad worried because I knew we would have to come back up this monster and I was not too thrilled about that. Most of the run was a blur…got to see all the stuff you see on the Universal Back Lot tram tour (Jaws, Bates Motel, crashed plane), walked a lot of the course, saw someone I knew, there were lots of hills, I got a little toasty in all my gear, the before I knew it I was DONE! I was technically signed up for the 10k, but did the 5k instead. The 10k did two loops, and one loop of that course was plenty for me!

It took my about 40 minutes to do the course, when I walked I really tried to book it and was keeping a 13 minute per mile pace. But still really freakin slow! After I was done I went straight for the pancakes, they were yummy! I also picked up some coffee, kettle corn, free drinks and then I headed to the car. I was home by 8:50 and in the shower by 9:15AM and at church right on time.

Overall, the race was really well organized and the course was cool. Parking was free and easy (big bonus). There were some really cool free giveaways…only fail is that the guy at registration gave me a kids medium t-shirt…which is okay because I will never where the dang thing because it is ugly…

Like I said, good race, good times, and hopefully I can get off my a$$ now and start working out again!

I have been stagnant for over a month now. I have not done any physical activity since the Solvang Prelude which was November 7th. But it is now ready to come to an end…

One of the blogs I read, Skinny Runner (which is hilarious, BTW), posted that she signed up for a race here in L.A. but would be out of town and wanted to know if any L.A.ers wanted it…well…I qualified…so I e-mailed her and now I will be Ms. Skinny Runner for the Say No To Drugs Race that will be run on the Universal Studios Backlot. She is signed up for the 10k, but since I have not been doing any training…I am going with the 5k and it will also give me PLENTY of time to get back and have some of the pancake breakfast, and then get to church. So free entry, free parking, free breakfast, all I have to do is get my butt out of bed at 6AM on Sunday morning.

Now, it will be VERY cold out…I am thinking 40 degrees (which for this SoCal girl is freakin cold!) So I need to think wardrobe here and make sure I wear layers…lots of layers…

In other news, The Pasadena Triathlon Club had it’s annual End of Year Party and it was AWESOME! George and I went in with a strategy this year and bought a bunch of raffle tickets and put 20 in one cup and the other 20 in another cup. So what did we win????

First of all, we won 2 sets of wheel disc covers: (not the most flattering picture…but whatever)

They go on your back wheel and are removable and don’t cost as much as an actual Aero Disc Wheel. Those retail for about $85 a set, George and I won 2 sets and we would have won the 3rd but we told them to pull again so someone else could join in on the fun. The wheel disc covers were courtesy of www.WheelBuilder.com, the owner is a member of the club and donated the prizes. Now we just have to go to his shop and get them custom cut for our wheels.

Then we won the other thing we wanted, which was a Chi Running session with Steve Mackel. That one is worth $150 and we are totally stoked about that since George and I fail at running!

Last but not least, I also won 2nd runner up Triathlete of the Year and got a pretty sweet award thingy!

Doing my Vana White pose with Marvin, the 2009 President of the club.

All in all it was an awesome night, I must have had my lucky hat on because I won some other smaller stuff as well. I am looking forward to the 2010 season and seeing where it takes us. All I know is that I am glad that I get to do it with my best friend and partner and it is his BIRTHDAY today! So I get to spoil him for the weekend

I also promise to blog more, been a bad blogger lately

So I realize this blog is supposed to be about someone who does triathlons, runs races and other various things at a slow pace…but what do you write about when you don’t do any of that anymore? I seriously have not done anything since the Solvang Prelude…which really wasn’t much because I biked 30 miles of what should have been 62 miles of riding…and since then I can’t really fathom getting on my bike because I feel as though I have been a tad traumatized by the whole situation in general. And as for my workout room? That has gone no where fast! The guest bed is out and my bike and trainer are upstairs…just not in the right room or set up… ugh…

One thing I have done a wonderful job at is stuffing my face, so my arms are really toned because it takes a lot of strength to get the fork load of sweet potato pie, candied yams and turkey in your mouth!

So with that…I have decided I need to get moving… do you have any motivational tips?

I was thinking that I could get motivated by changing the scenery a bit. I am going to San Francisco tomorrow and Thursday and am thinking I can do a little run while I am there. There is something fascinating and cool about working out in a different place from where you live…and I don’t mean the hotel fitness room! So I will drag my booty out to the Embarcadero and do some running….I am not committing to any mileage, I will be lucky if I can do 1 mile without having to take a taxi back to the hotel. So we will see…and I will be really pissed if I drag all my running gear up with me and then don’t run…that sucks.

Hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Here are the candied yams I made, I would have saved you some but I need to get my arm workouts in.