My little Man

This is my little man and his buds-in the yellow tie-Ian Scott, age 8. As a second grader-this was his first official spring concert up on the big stage at the middle school. Trust me-there will be many more to come!!

Partying w/Stanley...in the rain!

I worked last night 11pm - 7:30am. I only work 2 nights a week-and they are always in a row, never on the weekend, and never on a holiday. It is a sweet set up and I love my job. My first night is always rough because I'm lucky if I get 2 hours sleep going into it. Usually I get none. I came home this morning and was asleep by 8:30. Then awake at 10, then 11, then 12. I finally got up at 12:15-not enough sleep and I'll be feeling the pain at 3am tonite! Anyway-I got up and got right on my bike despite the fact that it was already drizzling outside. We had beautiful weather here in Central NY last week and once I get out on my bike-it is REALLY hard to ride inside on the trainer. So out the door I went-ready for a hill workout. Hills are not hard to come by in these parts. In fact-we live at the highest point in Manlius-so high we are the only neighborhood on a well-cuz they couldn't get the city water up to us! Anyway, I was feeling good and getting bored of doing hill repeats close to home (I didn't wanna get too far away cuz it looked like the skies would open up at any moment and 49degrees in the pouring rain is not fun). So I decided to head over to the infamous Stanley Road-the biggest climb around-and up until today I had managed to avoid meeting up w/Mr. Stanley. So I'm riding along, there were some pretty big hills and then suddenly I am at the top of the steepest freakn hill I've ever seen. Now it is really raining and the road is quite sandy. I realize that this is it-THE WALL-as I have now named it. The problem-I was going to have to ride down it before I could ride up it. I had my ass hanging off the back of my seat because it was so steep I seriously thought i may do an endo (go over the handlebars-for you non-cyclists). I had no idea you could ride up a hill going that slow and not fall over!!! Not to mention that my back tire was spinning in the wet sand. Stanley was everything I imagined and more. We will meet again soon...

Swimming Woes

Today I was reminded of why I stopped swimming at the y and started swimming at Cazenovia College. At the YMCA they have a water aerobics class(es) every morning between the hours of 8:30 and 10-11:30. This in itself is an issue-because this is my Prime swimming time and it doesn't seem fair to me that they would fill this time w/water aerobics M-F-but they do and they aren't gonna change it. During these class times they close up to 4 out of 6 lanes down for the class. Today they closed down 4 lanes and I was in the lane closest to where the aerobics class was happening in the rest of the pool. As I came to wall for a quick rest, one of aerobics queens tapped me on the shoulder and this is what she said, "Excuse me, I know you are lap swimming, but every time you swim by us you are splashing us. Is there anyway you can not do that??" OMG. Are you Effing kidding me? My response, "Uh, no-there isn't a way I cannot do that-this is a swimming pool!!!" Unbelievable. Back to Caz college I go!

“I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.” Jack London.

“There is an ecstasy that marks the summit of life, and beyond which life cannot rise. And such is the paradox of living, this ecstasy comes when one is most alive, and it comes as a complete forgetfulness that one is alive.” Jack London.

"Life is not a matter of holding good cards, but sometimes, playing a poor hand well." Jack London.

You may notice a theme. My friend and running partner Ben Clardy inspired me to read The Call of the Wild last winter. This led to me reading most of Jack London's works. Somehow during my undergraduate reading I had escaped this great American author. After having watched Bruce Mackey win another Iditarod, I had a desire to get out in the wild winter and run a race. The Yukon 300, Susitna and Arrowhead all came to mind, but recently here in my neck of the woods the Beast of Burden came into being. I decided that this would be my fouray into winter racing.

This is the first winter that I have run outside all winter long. In winters past I have run outside intermittently on a sunny day when the roads were well plowed, but this winter I have gone outside every day and night to run, in lake effect snow, frigid wind chill and by the bright cold light of full moon. It has been quite humbling. Running on a snowy trail is significantly more work than anything else I have ever done. Muscles I didnt know that I have have been sore and stiff. The longer one runs the more this seems to set in, and its exponentially effected by the "feels like" temperature. You quickly learn in winter the "feels like" temperature is all that matters. It may say 20 degrees on the thermometer but if the weather channel says it "feels like" 5 or -5, believe it and be ready to freeze your @$% off.

So finally it comes down to the time for the race and although I feel that I have prepared as best as I can I know that anything can happen and that is what I must be prepared for. Let it snow.
Matt

"Don’t bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself." - William Faulkner

Beast of Burden

Matt is racing the Beast of Burden 100 mile Winter Ultra next Saturday. We don't often get to see each other participate in these crazy events but I will be there as part of his crew for this one. And I'm SO EXCITED. I love to watch Matt race. He is a smarty pants racer. Patient and calculating-and this often leads to a great result. It is so hard not to start out to fast-especially when you are feeling good but Matt is a master at keeping his ego in check. He is not the guy you want to see coming up on you with 10 miles to go. He is not the guy you count out if you see him hurling at mile 60-for him that is just a fresh start. No matter what happens-I know it will be an adventure-a fun one at that. Can't wait!

Training for the Triple

Lots of people have been asking me how in the world you train for a triple ironman. Truthfully, I have no clue. One thing I know for sure is that this race will take alot of flexibility and so my plan is to be flexible with my training. I plan to train hard when I'm feeling good and back down when I'm feeling fatigued. The plan for now is to do some serious base training in all 3 disciplines. I'm terrible at keeping a training log-it feels too much like work. Usually at the end of the week I try and tally it up in my head. As far as I can remember here are last weeks totals:
Swim-9,000 yards (3,000 yards straight x 3 days-just building the mileage back up).
Bike-6 hours
Run-7 hours
I should definitely be biking more than running. However, I've been doing a run focus for 6 weeks w/no biking so I am just getting back in the saddle-and the toosh is feelin it! I did get a new saddle-the adamo road which I really like so far-but it does need some tweaking. Next week I will surely have more than 6 hours in the saddle as today I've put in 4!