Can I Borrow The Hubble Telescope Please.

Here's the thing about trying to fit the last months of Ironman training into a normal life: it's not normal. In fact, it's impossible. There's nothing normal about it. I'd even go as far to says as it's borderline cruel and unusual self-punishment. Sleep, for instance, is the dangling carrot that you can only see with a Hubble telescope. You can sense something dangling in front of you - and you know it's something you really really want - it's just so zip dang far away you can't quite make out what the heck it actually is, aside from the fact that if you squint your eyes you can tell it looks kinda orange. For all I know, it could be a prison jumpsuit. Either way, it doesn't really matter cause you'll never get it. There's just no catching up on sleep no matter how you slice the pizza. So you walk around consistently tired.

And then there are the legs. I come from a family of runners and athletes. We've got marathoners up the yin-yang in my clan. In fact, we're the type of annoying people that don't take escalators - we'd rather climb the steps, thank you very much. Truth be told, many of us would also opt-out of the elevator ride in exchange for a few calf-strengthening flights of stairs. You say the meeting is on the seventeenth floor? No problem... but I might be five minutes late. Oh, and if you can have a bottle of H2O and a towel waiting for me while you're up there, that'd be nifty.

But all that daily strengthening machismo gets thrown by the wayside around this stage of Ironman training. I remember earlier this year I'd walk up the 15 flights of stairs to my office every day without a thought. Now, however, my legs are so tired from the daily pounding that I take the wheelchair ramp just to get up on the curb. And that's a struggle. Hell, if I could get the padding correct, I'd go down stairs on my butt like I did as a wee laddie.

There's a part of me that wishes the Ironman race were this weekend. I just want to get it all over with and resume my (arguably) normal life. Please, somebody make the bad man stop.

But there's another part of me that is really a glutton for this punishment. There's that part of me that says, I missed two workouts this week, it's going to take me at least another three months before I'm really ready. Or maybe I didn't go quite far enough on my 6 hour ride - I'd feel a lot more confident if I had logged in another 30 miles.

But it never ends, the justification and self-questioning. So tomorrow I will run faster, stretch out my arms further…And one fine morning -
So I beat on, bike against the headwind, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

[I didn't quite know how to end this rambling, so I figured I'd just plagiarize F. Scott Fitzgerald instead.]

You Can Call Me James Dean If You Want.

I was supposed to have a 2 hour ride this morning and a 40 minute ride this evening. You wanna know what I did? I slept in until 7:30 this morning. And then I got up and ate breakfast. Didn't even look at my bike.

And tonight know what I did? I got a massage. Then I ate again.

That's right. I'm a rebel. I'm not sure I have a cause either.

Maybe I Should Start To Enjoy Swimming. Naahhh... Maybe Next Year.

Morning Workout
SWIM
3300 meters
Main Set: 20 x 100 meter sprints, easy on the "sprint"

Evening Workout
RUN
90 minutes...no scratch that...I mean 50 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Random Comments: The swim went well this morning. Swims always seem to go well these days. You know why? Cause I don't really give a flying crap about the swim, that's why. It'll all be over in a little over an hour anyway. I can go the distance and I won't be winning any Mark Spitz awards. I've come to terms with that and that's OK. As for the run, that's another story entirely.

I love running and am trying to get over the anger of being so piddlingly slow these days. At least tonight my legs are tired, so I have an excuse to go slow for the pre-scheduled 90 minute jog. In fact, though a bit uncomfortable, the first 50 minutes went by without much drama. Unfortunately, it was right there at 50 minutes that the drama started with somewhat of a Shakespearean attitude (I don't know what that means, but it sure sounds good). It was there at 50 minutes that the electric jolt of pain streamed through my body. It was kind of like somebody took a live battery, shoved it up my ass and flipped a rather over-sized switch that may have been sporting a bright red Warning sticker. The electricity surged down my quads, through my hamstrings, past my knees, scowering my calves, scorching my achilles and bolting from the bottom of my feet. In an instant, my legs said "that's it, we're done" and within that same instant I pretty much agreed with them.

I stood there on the side of the road for a few minutes screaming in tongues... AAAAARRRHHHHH!!! GARRRUMMMPAHPPPP!!! BLLLLLEEEEHHHHAAAARRR!! Shortly there after I started swearing.

Having gotten that out of my system, I turned around and started hobbling the 2 1/2 miles back home.

You know what, I probably shouldn't take the swimming for granted after all.

Has Anybody Seen My Quadriceps? I Seem To Have Misplaced Them.

Morning Workout
BIKE...
Two 20 kilometer time trials with lots of warm up, cool down and rest in-between, making it something like a two hour twenty minute ride.
Heart Rate Zone: It was supposed to be an all out VO2 ride (Zone 5+) but my legs didn't seem to want to move, so I was humbly huffing and puffing in Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

...RUN
20 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: It was supposed to be a zippy AC run (Zone 3) but, again, the legs didn't want to cooperate. I had to stop and stretch out the calves three times, after the third I finally had it and just jogged my way back home, averaging a heart rate in the Aerobic (Zone 1) category. Lame-o.

Evening Workout
LIFT WEIGHTS
35 minutes

Random Comments: I woke up at 4am this morning, a whopping 5 hours of sleep, give or take something or other. I was out of bed by 5 am and got ready for my workout. My pathetic workout with my overly tired legs. Five hours later, I was finally getting on with my day. Three hours after that I really needed a nap in a big bad way. I didn't get one. I imagine I'll probably start hallucinating soon. That should be fun.

If You Can't Stand The Heat, Get Your Head Out Of The Oven

Morning Workout
BIKE...
78-ish miles
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

...RUN
13.2153 miles, give or take a hundredth of a mile
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Random Comments: It was a hundred and forty-five degrees outside during my workout today. I know.... I couldn't believe it either. People were dying from dehydration just by opening up their front doors. Squirrels were falling from the trees like snowflakes (except for snowflakes land daintily and these squirrels hit with a SPLATTT! and lay on the roadside like a rodent rendition of the Normandy invasion.) Even the rattlesnakes, the denizens of hellfire, couldn't handle the heat; they were slithering en masse out into the middle of the crowded roadway and committing suicide by Goodyear.

It was ugly.
Apocalyptic, one can even say.
In fact, I just did.

And through it all, I pedaled my bike and shuffled my feet for a good 7 hours of dehydrating pain. And when I say pain, I mean "really really tiring and very very hot". Dare I say, but today's workout may very well have been the most challenging training day I've had all year. And the irony of it all is that my body felt fine - no knee pain, no achilles pain, no calf pain, no upset stomach. OK, maybe that's not ironic, but it's good information to know anyway. And, sure, maybe it wasn't exactly a hunnerd forty five outside, but it damn sure felt like it. And maybe the squirrel fallings and snake suicide comments are a periwinkle short of the entire truth, but let me tell you, there were enough squished snakes and dismembered squirrels on the roadside to raise a few questions.

So anyway, it was really hot during my workout today.
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Star Spotting Of The Day From Four Days Ago: Cameron Diaz

Location: American Airlines flight #3 from JFK to LAX, first class section

What She Was Doing: I don't exactly know what she was doing, but I'll tell you what she was not doing, and that's eating a steak. She is so ridiculously, disgustingly thin, homegirl needs to EAT SOME FOOD - and a lot of it. I mean, somebody's gotta shove a few cheeseburgers down her face before she disintegrates - 0r ends up on the wrong side of a holocaust movie.
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I've seen some funny things out on the road before, but this one's gotta take the cake.

I'm on my way back from my bike ride, somewhere around mile 65 and definitely not delirious. I know what I saw - there was no hallucinating. There's this bus stop in Malibu, right on the Pacific Coast Highway, that is somewhat in the middle of nowhere. The only things at the bus stop are a bench for people to sit on and a sign-post that I assume let's you know when the next bus is supposed to come by.

As I'm approaching this bus stop, I look up from my bike and see this Fabio looking guy standing there. Odd already, but it gets better. He's wearing nothing but a pair of jeans. No shirt, no shoes - no nothing. Just jeans. His body, as you can imagine, is chiseled like... well... like Fabio's. And this guy is leaning against the sign-post, with his arms crossed casually over his chest as if he were posing for a GQ photo. Keep in mind, this bus stop, as I mentioned, is in the middle of nowhere. There is absolutely nobody else around. But he's posing.

You've got to be kidding me, I thought as I got closer. Maybe this guy is a male prostitute and this is his proverbial corner where he picks up the wealthy, lonely Malibu-ettes. Interesting.

But that's not even the weird part of the story. You see, as I rode by this freak of a fella, I noticed a couple of things leaning against the bus stop bench; things that clearly belonged to him. When I saw them, I became baffled - and there were only two things. Just two things: a beach cruiser and a chainsaw.

HUH?!?!

What does somebody, much less this half-naked Fabio-looking fella, need in the middle of Malibu with a beach cruiser and a chainsaw. Beach cruiser I can understand.... but chainsaw?! Homeboy definitely ain't cutting down any forests looking like that. And while I'm at it, does he really carry the chainsaw when he's riding his beach cruiser? Isn't that dangerous? Can't you, like, lose an arm or something? Hell, I nearly fall when I reach down to grab a water bottle - and that's not even a deadly weapon.

As I saw the items, I took another quick look at Fabio in disbelief. He gave me a smirk.
I don't really need a smirk from this chap.

Needless to say, I kept on riding.

The Traffic, It Stops And Goes. Sometimes For No Reason Whatsoever

Morning Workout
BIKE
1 hour 40 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1)

Afternoon / Evening Workout
LIFT WEIGHTS...
30 minutes

...SWIM
3100 yards
Main Set: 5 x 400 yards off 20 seconds rest

RUN
1.32 miles

Random Comments: I hate traffic. With a passion. It is, without question, the single most annoying thing about Los Angeles. The fact is that the traffic doesn't stop in this city, it just varies in it's levels of absurdity. Sure it's slow going during the work week, that I can understand and effectively avoid. But what's with the bumper-to-bumper traffic every single weekend?! I mean, that's just not normal. And if that's not bad enough, there will be random days when, without warning and for no apparent reason whatsoever, traffic throughout the entire city will be at a dead standstill. It's like every single person in the city decided to drive at exactly the same precise moment. There's gotta be lottery winning odds for that one. The thing is, it happens time and again. Tonight was one of those nights.

I was supposed to meet friends for cocktails at 6:00 in Westwood. So, fresh off my abbreviated swim, I left Santa Monica at 5:45 to get to the restaurant. On any normal day, the fifteen minutes would've been more than sufficient time to make that drive. Today, however, was not any normal day. Traffic was at a complete stand-still. A ridiculous stand-still. I mean, sitting in the same place for ten minutes, not moving an inch type of stand-still. No matter which short cut I decided to take, nothing was moving. At some locations, it took me ten minutes to travel two blocks. Absurd. It makes me want to move to some remote town fifteen miles outside of Bumblef**k, Nowhere.

After over an hour of this nonsense, I was steaming. My mind was homicidal and I knew I was about to snap. Finally, 75 minutes and two miles after I started, I was still over a mile away and, following some quick calculations, I deduced that the mile would take me another 30 minutes to drive. I can't stand this, I thought. I want to kill somebody. Anybody will do.

Do I want to spend 30 minutes driving another mile? Hell no. For Godsakes, it'd be faster if I ran there.

That's about when the bells started going off in my head. And it was also about the time when I remembered that I was an Ironman athlete with a clean set of workout clothes in the trunk of my car. Within seconds I made a U-turn and jammed the car into the first parking spot I could find. I grabbed my workout clothes and did a Superman-like quick-o change-o in the front seat of my car. I shoved my dress clothes in the backpack, strapped that to my body and off I went. My fourth workout for the day.

Not but ten minutes later I was in the restaurant, a bit sweaty but much more relaxed from the run. I hopped into the men's room to change my sweaty body back into the dress clothes and just like that, I was sitting with my friends having a nice cold beer.

And somehow this all seemed normal to me.

Here's The Status Report

Morning Workout
BIKE... (on the trainer)
30 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Steady State Threshold (Zone 4)

...RUN
15 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Steady State Threshold (Zone 4)

Random Comments: This morning's bike ride was pretty darn hard. As is standard, my legs got tired extremely quickly. Like usual, I was dripping sweat like a human spigot. And as is par for the course, I watched TV the entire time (the latest episode of Entourage, if you really want to know. Which, for the record, was as wonderful as always.) All in all the bike ride was pretty status quo.

Status quo.

Have you ever thought about that phrase, status quo? Or, more specifically, the word quo. Fun word, quo. I mean, I can do without status. I get a lot of status. What's the status of the project? Would you please write up a status report. Status is all over the place. It's overused, the status. But quo? Now there's a word you can wrap your arms around. It's a word you don't get to use every day. And quo is interesting. It can't really stand on it's own. It's not a loner, the quo.. To the contrary, it relies on status for it's very existence. In fact, quo owes it's life to status. Without status, there is no quo. Status is like the oxygen to quo's breathing. It is the blood that keeps quo's heart beating. Yet quo is so much more fun than status. Status is dull. Quo is exciting. Status stays home alone at night. Quo goes out on the town, rockin' it till the morning comes. Say it with me... quo. Again (and out loud this time, don't worry, nobody's listening).... quo. Quo. Isn't it great the way it takes control of your lips; the way it causes the mouth to pucker in a pre-kiss stance. Quo. Quo.

So anyway, my bike ride this morning was pretty darn hard.

Quite A Predicapickle

Afternoon Workout
BIKE
55 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Random Comments: Here’s the problem… my body needs 8 hours of sleep. That’s just a fact. I’m much more alert and less of a jerk when I get 8 hours each night. However, I’m training so much that I have to wake up early and go to sleep late in order to cram it all in. As a result, I usually only get 6 or 7 hours of sleep each night. I’m constantly tired, continually struggling to keep up with my body's needs but never being able to reach that tryptophin-laced carrot. After a few days of this minimal sleep, I crave the Rest days – that one day of the week when there is no exercise; when I can get to sleep early and sleep on through the night. And that’s exactly where the problem lies…

Throughout the week, the training makes me tired. All of the running, biking and swimming allows me to sleep soundly at night. On the rest days when I don’t train, my body gets all confused. As a result, it becomes much harder to sleep on those night. So the one night each week that I should be able to get a good night’s sleep, is the one night that my body can’t get a good night sleep. And every week I fall further and further into the hole of sleep dep, never being able to get the rest I need.

And that, my friend, is quite a predica-pickle.

I Almost Went To Hell Today

Morning Workout
RUN
2 hours 20 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1) + Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Afternoon Workout
SWIM
1500 meters, pretty much straight through

Random Comments: I've got to admit, I had a pretty darn good run today (less the usual pain in the right calf and the ice pick that was apparently lodged in my right knee). I ran through the hills of Pennsylvania. Well, not all of the hills in Pennsylvania, just a few of them. Mostly just the ones surrounding my grandmother's house. Perhaps I'll run the rest of the Pennsylvania hills next year. But I wouldn't hold my breathe if I were you.

Speaking of holding my breathe, my sister and I went swimming at her local pool this afternoon. Specifically, her local outdoor, unheated pool in upstate New York. The ocean water in Los Angeles is about 65 degrees. This pool wasn't nearly that warm, just to put it in perspective for you. In fact, when we got there, we were the only ones in the water. There were six life guards around the pool and us - the silly people who were actually going swimming. However, truth be told, it's really the first 100 yards in that Polar Bear wonderland that has you dreaming of warm winter coats and evenings by the fire. After that, as long as you keep moving you're fine. And once the blood starts flowing, you start paying attention to your surroundings and recognizing all the creepy crawlies and hairy floaties throughout the pool. Though drowned crawlies are not uncommon for outdoor pools such as this one, it doesn't make it any less creepy when you look up and find yourself swimming right into something that at one time had the ability to fly away. Makes you just hold your breathe for an extra stroke as you try to push that dead little feller into the adjacent lane. I'll let that guy next to me deal with it.
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I almost went to hell today.

I was leaving my sister's house, driving through the backroads of upstate New York. Yes, perhaps I was driving a bit too fast. I don't remember seeing a speed limit sign, but I'm fairly sure I wouldn't be within whatever number they would think to post. Truth be told, the area is chock full of beautiful windy, tree-lined roads that go on for miles with barely another car in sight. I mean, it practically begs you to speed. And how can I deny the road like that when it's practically begging.

So anyway, I'm zipping along through the turns when all of the sudden not but a few feet in front of me, out of the bushes comes a mother duck followed by, in incredibly precious single file, her seven little ducklings who may very well be the cutest things I've seen since I'd left my nieces ten minutes earlier. I inhaled immediately and held my breathe. This is going to be trouble, I thought. I was going too fast and was already far too close to stop in time. Immediately, I had visions of crushed duck sticking to the tires of this car. I was about one second away from being a duck home wrecker and there was nothing I could do.

As I approached rapidly, the mother duck sensed me and in a brilliantly instinctive reaction, flapped her wings and flew out of the way before she left her chil'in as orphans. With the mother out of the way, I was able to swerve to the right of the road, my left tire barely skimming the beaks of the newborns. I looked in my rear view mirror as I passed them by, heaving a hugh sigh of relief as I saw the seven little chickadees huddled in a big circle in the middle of the road - completely petrified from their near death experience. Then, just as quickly, the smart little feckers jumped back into their single file positions and widdle waddled themselves right off the road as their mother flew back down to join them.

I'm not sure, but as I was driving away, it sure looked like she flipped me the bird.

Lions And Tigers And Bears, Oh S**t!

Morning Workout
BIKE
4 hours 40 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1) to Steady State Threshold (Zone 4) and all spots in between.

RUN
30 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Random Comments: I could easily sit here and complain about my ride, about the headwind, the cold and the hills, about the pedals that didn't fit, the bike that didn't fit and the jacket that didn't fit. I could talk to you about how I've had enough with biking. Of how biking is my weakest sport and it's getting slower and weaker every single day. I could tell you that I hope the Ironman race comes around at least one day before I inevitably take the chainsaw to my two-wheeled nemesis. But I'm not going to talk about all of that stuff, cause, as it so happens, a bear walked in front of me during my run today. And, frankly, that's a helluva lot more interesting.

I was staying at my sisters house, just a few clicks to the west of absolutely nowhere. There's a lot of woods and open land here. In fact, we saw quite the variety of wildlife on our ride: deer, pheasant, cows, horses... there may even have been a turduckin or two in there as well, I'm not quite sure. But once you see a bear, the rest of the wildlife means nothing.

I was 20 minutes into what was only a 30 minute run, zipping along and feeling pretty darn good when all of the sudden the bear walked right out into the road, not but 30 feet in front of me. As you can imagine, I stopped pretty quickly and pretty quietly and started backing up with the hope that he wouldn't turn around and do something stupid. Like eat me. Or tear off my arm.

There was only one way back to my sister's place and the bear happened to be right in the middle of me and the finish line. So I waited for him to get off the road. And I waited some more. But he didn't move. He just roamed around on the side there, playing in the weeds and overgrown grass. I started whistling and yelling to let him know I was around - mostly cause I remember reading this in some book about "things you should do in order to avoid getting eaten by bears". He looked at me, the bear did, but he didn't move. Mental note, write to the author of that book and tell him his technique doesn't work.

As I stood there trying to think of a new angle to get past this bear, he disappeared behind a tree and out of my site. I inched closer, looking for him behind that tree to see if it was safe for me to pass or if he were merely waiting to pounce. I expected to see nothing as much as I expected him to be preparing his dental floss. Fortunately, I saw nothing. Closer and closer I came and still, nothing. Finally, when I was just about at the tree, I decided it was safe to start running, so I did. A few steps into my re-start, I glanced to my left only to see my new friend, the bear, this time about 100 feet away from me, galloping along at my same pace.

Needless to say, I picked up my pace and I did it fast. The bear headed off into the woods and I finished those last 10 mintues of my run in about 7 minutes.

You can call me Grizzlyman if you want. That'd be OK.

It Was A Cold And Rainy Night

Well, my relaxing rest week is over. It's 10:15 pm right now and I am going to wake up in 7 hours and embark on what is supposed to be a 6 hour ride and 30 minute run. Of course, it's supposed to rain tomorrow which is a fine how-dee-doo for my re-entry into the training world. Fortunately I have a great rain jacket that keeps me dry when I bike. Unfortunately, I left that jacket in California, 3000 miles away from where I'll be riding. Oh, and I just checked the weather - it's supposed to be 53 degrees in the morning. It should go without saying that I forgot to bring armies or any type of long sleeve jersey. That'll smart.

So this oughta be fun.
Perhaps I'll ride directly to the hospital in the morning, do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars.

I wonder if I can call in advance and pre-order my pneumonia medicine.
_________________________________________________________________

Star Spotting Of The Day (specifically, yesterday): Mike White, who, believe it or not, I recognized as the actor from Chuck & Buck. When I looked into him a bit further, I realized he is oh so much more - like, for instance, the writer of that indie masterpiece and the guy who wrote such other classics as The School Of Rock, The Good Girl (with Jennifer Aniston) and Nacho Libre, not to mention some scribbling for Dawsons Creek, which come to think of it, I kinda wish I didn't mention.

Location: Walking down San Vicente Blvd in Brentwood with his dog

What He Was Doing: Walking down San Vicente Blvd in Brentwood with his dog

A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Airport

Morning Workout
SWIM
3100 meters, 3000 of which were done without stopping

Random Comments: As you know, I’ve been smack dab in the middle of the Suck phase of training. My bike rides have been horrendous and my runs have been painfully mediocre. As a result, I decided to play the sane card and take the rest of the week off from training. And when I say “take the week off” I mean it in the most triathlete-esque way. Which is to say that I’ve been working out for about one hour each day, an amount most normal people would consider pretty darn active, and one most triathletes consider just short of Crazy Glued to the couch with an IV of Pabst Blue Ribbon dripping into your veins and a continuous drizzle of potato chip crumbs dropping from your unshaven face. Not wanting to spend too much time on the bike during these so-called relaxing days, I’ve found myself splashing around in the pool a bit more than expected. And, slap-me-across-the-face-and-call-me-Mary, but all the swims I’ve been having this week have been pretty darn good. Or, as I like to say, they’re as good as swimming gets for me. Take today’s 3000 meters, for instance (which only got bumped up from my planned 2000 meters because Cat said she was going to swim 3000 and, well, that kinda motivated me). As you can imagine, swimming that long in a pool can get pretty challenging. In a nutshell, it’s hellishly boring. And the thing is, there isn’t even that much time to let your mind wander into nothingness, because you’ve got to keep counting your laps. If your mind wanders you lose count, and if you lose count, you have to go back to the last lap number you remember finishing, and when you do that you usually end up swimming a lot more laps than you are supposed to – or want to, for that matter – and your finishing time doesn’t reflect how fast it really takes you to swim 3000 meters in the first place. But today, my friend, everything was good. Consistently, unflailingly good. I like that in a workout. Dare I say, but perhaps I'm finally leaving the Suck phase...
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Cat’s car has been rattling something fierce for the past few months. It seems to have been coming from the rear of the car but I haven’t been able to figure out the exact location. I’ve looked under the car a few times to examine it all because, well, I’m a man and that’s what we do. But, understanding that I barely know the difference between a distributor cap and a gas cap, my under-car kanoodling simply resulted in a few random harrumphs and mumblings. You definitely need to bring it in and get it checked out, I’d say in a definitive way, knowing very well that I could’ve said the same words with the same authority without having to first lay down on the dirty road and suck in the car’s exhaust.

Can you help me bring it in tomorrow? Cat would ask me
Tomorrows no good, I’d say. I’ve got a day of meetings. How about the next day?
Can’t do it then, she’d shake her head. Not enough time.
And so it would go, rattling on until we found ourselves right here, months later and nothing fixed.

***

I’m flying to New York today. In fact, I’m on the plane as I type this. Cat tried to drive me to the airport but that didn’t seem to work out so well. We hadn’t gotten but a few miles on our way when the normal rattling in Cat’s car suddenly escalated to an obscene clanking. Either somebody quickly tied a bunch of “Just Married” cans to the back of the car or we’re in deep trouble, I thought to myself. I looked back. Nope, no “Just Married” cans. We’re in trouble.

Has this crazy rattling been happening for long? I asked.
No, she said tensely. It just started right now.
Ah, that’s not good. Why don’t we pull to the side of the road and I’ll take a look, I said in my very manly way as I pointed towards the closest curb.

As she pulled to a stop I got out of the car and assumed my usual macho position, laying flat on my back under the tail of the automobile, gazing incredulously at the back of the wheel and all the rusted out parts under there. Nothing looked out of the ordinary to me. That is to say, I didn’t see any big arrows with flashing neon lights saying something like This Part Is Broken, Don’t Drive Any Further.

I got back in the car, harrumphed and mumbled. I couldn’t see anything, I said, why don’t we try driving slowly.

Not but a few feet down the road the rattling started again. After some quick thinking, we decided to take my car instead. Cat turned the rattling auto around and we started driving very slowly back to my place. I looked out the sideview mirror as we drove, nervous about that shaking, hoping I could sense anything happening back there. Lo and behold, I did. The rear tire was wobbling madly like a spinning plate on a bamboo stick that’s about to crash to the floor in a million little pieces (I just plagiarized those last four words from James Frey. That’ll show him, the little such and such)

Holy shit! I said staring more closely at the wheel gone wild.

It was about that time that I heard a very large CLANK! RATTLERATTLE and gazed behind the car to see a fairly significant looking bolt fall out and bounce it’s way down the street.

Uh, honey… why don’t we pull over. A big bolt just fell out from the car and that’s probably not that good.

I got out of the car and ran back down the road to pick up the bolt. After all, I thought, maybe I can jam it back into place and then, well, the car would be all nice and fine. I’d be the brilliant macho mechanic and we can drive calmly to the airport. Problem solved.

Unfortunately life is not that easy. I grabbed the bolt, then lay back down in my usual position underneath the back of the car. I gazed around looking for answers. The flashing neon sign was still not there but, almost by accident, I found out where the bolt had fallen from. It’s called the suspension. Now, thanks to my superior mechanical genius, I realized that this 3 inch bolt which fell off the car would probably create a lot safer ride if it were back in the car. In fact, it appears that the bolt was holding the rear wheel together. Through a very intricate process of deduction that could only be accurately explained to similarly mechanically inclined people as myself, I’d realized that it’s probably not good to drive this car any further. I climbed out from under the car and with nary a harrumph or mumble, heroically said, It’s not looking good, honey. The bolt fell from the thingy and it looks pretty serious. You need to get the car to your mechanic.

So as Cat called AAA to get her car towed, I pulled my suitcase out of the car and dragged it down the road to the closest hotel where I hopped in a taxi and high-tailed it to the airport.

I thank the Lord herself that Cat wasn’t driving down the highway when this happened. But fortunately, due to my unprecedented automotive know-how, I saved my girlfriends life. And now all is back to normal in Metropolis.

I guess now I’ll have to come up with a good superhero name for myself... Hmmm, Automaton. I like that one. Is that taken?

Now Entering The Suck Stage

Morning Workout
RUN
54 steps
Heart Rate Zone: Beating. But barely.

SWIM
Main Set: 20 x 100 yards with 5-10 seconds rest in between, if you want to call that rest. I don't really think 5 seconds qualifies as "rest" but...whatever.

Random Comments: There are different stages in training. There's the Base Building stage, the Strength stage, the Speed stage, and on it goes. Right now I'm in the Suck stage. It's called the Suck stage for a couple of reasons. First, because there is so much high intensity exercise that it sucks the energy right out of you and doesn't bother to ever let you rest long enough to get it back. The second reason it's called the Suck stage is because, clearly, it sucks.

I went for an 85 mile ride this weekend with just short of 4000 feet of climbing. I was tired at the end. The funny thing is, though, that I couldn't get my heartrate beyond Aerobic - my legs wouldn't allow me too, even while trudging up that 7 mile hill. Then on Monday I went for what was supposed to be an hour long, very high intensity ride. Once again, my legs didn't really bother to show up. They could push my heart rate to Aerobic levels, but that's about the limit of what they would do. After that weak effort, they seem to just go on strike, holding up picket signs and chanting silly phrases like "hell no, we won't go" and "no more bikey, we don't likey". And they do it all in two-part harmony, which gets me even more riled up. My legs, it seems, are unionizing and, completely candid, I run a strictly non-union body. Clearly we've got problems.

It was all capped off with the disagreement the legs and I had this morning on my 54 step run. When I started the run, I had every intention of going much further than 54 steps. In fact, I had 90 minutes lodged into my mind. I kept this as a surprise to the legs, for fear of some sort of retaliation - a coup d'limb, if you will. Apparently, though, they've got an inside man on the job, because they found out my plans pretty darn quickly. The crumple-inducing leg cramp hit at step 48. I stopped and stretched, determined to not let them ruin my run. Then I took a big deep breath and began running again. That lasted a whopping 6 steps before the "holy shit this hurts" cramp came back again. Enough. Enough, already.

I gave in.
It's time to go to the negotiating table.

And that's what I'm doing this week, negotiating. Better yet, I'm holding out until they decide to work harder. Clearly my body is too tired, I don't have the energy to push myself forward. So this week, I sleep. And I wait. I wait until the legs are refreshed and ready to begin doing some work for me for a change. Cause I know, eventually this isn't gonna Suck anymore.

And then I'll show them who's boss.

The Creepy-Crawly Heebie-Jeebie Malibu Bike Ride Blues

Morning Workout
BIKE...
5 hours 41 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1). It was supposed to be Lactate Threshold (Zone 2), according to the Grand Plan but, alas, the legs just didn't want to move today. In fact, the whole ride was frustrating for a variety of reasons that I won't get into right now.

...RUN
31 minutes and 47 seconds of unbridled excitement that I was finally off the damn bike
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Random Comments: There must've been a bug and snake convention in Malibu today because they were out in full force. Or maybe it was just the unbridled heat. Either way, it was a creepy crawly ride. It started about 1 hour in when we passed what looked eerily like a California Kingsnake just sunning himself right there on the side of the road. I nearly ran over the little fecker. Cat didn't notice him. But that would come back to haunt her later. Specifically, the haunting occured at about 3 hours into our ride. A three foot rattler was coiled up in the middle of the road, just about striking distance from Cat as she approached on her bike. She got freaked out a little. However, that "a little" turned into "freaked out a lot" when, as she got next to the mammoth-like snake, a fella on his motorcycle came blasting by. In a sudden echoing - CRUNCH! SPLAT! - he ran right smack-dab, point blank over that snake. Though I was too far back to witness it, it soon became clear that Cat has become permanently scarred from that sound, as images of projectile snake blood flooded her mind. Meanwhile, back where I was riding, some bubba-looking fellow stopped his white pick-up truck in the middle of the road, got out of the cab, walked over and picked up the run-over snake (which, for the record, was still moving). Holding the three foot rattling rattler in one hand, he climbed back into his truck and began driving, one-handed, off to someplace to do something that I'd rather not know about.

Those were the snakes. Now let's talk about the bugs.

There was the mosquito-like insect that flew into my mouth and got crushed into the Powerbar that I was chewing and was too tired and too hungry to spit out. Then there were the bugs that got lodged into Cat's gum (which she is usually chomping on as she rides and isn't going to let some imbedded bugs make her dispose of it). And of course there was the little fella that came buzzing out of nowhere and got so lodged between my lip and teeth that I had to literally reach up and slap it out. And supposedly there were four or five little black demons that kept circling my head in PigPen like fashion as I rode frustratingly up the canyon. I'm not sure if it was two of those little demons that got crushed on my glasses as we descended the white knuckle drop to the bottom. But it was definitely quite a few of their friends that ended their lives caught in the brambles of my forearm hair, forcing me to pick them out during our refueling stop. May they all rest in peace.

I suppose this one goes out to all the insects I've killed before.

Double Double

Morning Workout
BIKE
2 hours 31 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1)

Evening Workout
BIKE (yeah, again..)
57 minutes on the trainer
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic Conditioning (Zone 3)

Random Comments: I remember back when I was young and stupid, how I'd wake up early in the morning and go for a really long, really challenging run. Then I'd go to work for the day, come home in the evening and go for another long, fairly challenging run. After that I'd go to sleep and wake up a few hours later only to go biking or running yet again. People thought I was crazy. In some ways, I s'pose I thought I was crazy too. But those silly, immature days are long behind me now. When I was a child, I trained like a child; but now that I am a man, I've put away those childish ways.

And if you buy that one, I've got some ocean front property to sell you...

Don't Forget The Bathroom Reading

Morning Workout
RUN
90 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

Random Comments: Mental Note: Remember not to eat spicy hot chicken wings plus a bbq chicken and jalapeno pizza the night before a big morning run unless I want to toss and turn in bed all evening as the spiciness plays whack-a-mole with my intestines, only to get up in the wee hours of the pre-dawn morning feeling very angry and quite a bit tired before I venture out into the morning air for my run, and realize thirty minutes later that taking a sip of my special carbo-drink concoction doesn't make me feel satiated as much as it awakens the demons in the pit of my stomach who proceed to play trampoline bouncing games on my bowels. Cause I know if this happens, I won't drink anything else on the run until well after an hour when I realize that the dehydration-fueled delusions have accomplished a successful coup d'etat on my brain leaving me speaking-in-tongues in tongues I shouldn't be speaking. And eventually I will take a few gulps of water from the passing fountain and continue on my way only to realize a few seconds later that the demons no likey the water and in retaliation decide to unharness their vengence with pointed pitchforks as they start poke poke poking away at my internal organs, turning the previous evenings gastronomic ecstasy into a pain-filled, leg crossing, burning, throbbing catastrophe.

On the other hand, I could also just make sure I've got something really good to read in the bathroom.
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Star Spotting Of The Day: Cynthia Nixon. You know her, you love her from Sex & The City. Apparently she's in some Broadway show right now. Or at least I think I saw her in the New York Times' Arts & Leisure section yesterday. I'm pretty sure it was in the Theatre part too. Of course, I could be completely wrong. That's been known to happen. A lot.

Location: San Vicente Boulevard in Brentwood

What She Was Doing: Walking down the street. She probably just came out of Whole Foods since she was walking away from the front door. Come to think of it, I'd say that's a pretty fair bet, if I were a betting man. Which, by the by, I am.

The Quote-Unquote Italics Of Masochistic Pain

Morning Workout
BIKE
2 hours
Heart Rate Zone: 3 x 20 minutes at Steady State Threshold (Zone 4) with 10 minutes easy spinning in-between each set

RUN
21 minutes and 13 seconds
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2) + Aerobic Conditioning (Zone 3)

Random Comments: This was our first quote-unquote "real" day of training since that gloriously hellish Auburn race, eight days ago. (Yes, I said "quote-unquote" as well as used the actual quotations in both a repetitive and redundant fashion. Truth be told, I like saying quote-unquote because it adds such a great emphasis to the words you're speaking, and the fact is that its hard to show italics and bold when you speak without contorting your body into ways that are rather unnatural, if I do say so myself. I used to say things like, This was our first italic-nonitalic "real" day of training. But, as you can clearly see, that just sounds plain stupid and I got a whole bunch of "wow you're wierd" looks. So I've conformed to the "quote-unquote" quotes. I guess I'm just a conformist. Look at me, I'm a follower. But back to the training activities this morning...) The bike ride itself felt great. Nothing like taking a week off from training to make such a challenging workout feel so wonderful. The other nice thing is that, even though Cat and I had a full week of low intensity, relaxing nothingness, our injuries were patient enough to stay the course. How nice of them. So here we are, the evening of Memorial Day, Cat's got an ice pack on one knee and, if I can see across the room correctly, she may have another one on her hip and one on her back. I just removed the one from my achilles and the other one from my calf. As soon as I'm done typing this nonsense, I'll moan and groan my way onto the floor where I will proceed to stretch my back (that only hurts in three places now), whereby Cat and I will climb into bed all eager and willing to tackle our 90 minute run and 3500 meter swim in the morning. And the funny thing is, I'm happy about it all. It's like an old friend that's been on vacation for awhile. Granted, perhaps the friend can get annoying every now and then, but I've got to admit, if nothing else this friend is consistent. A pain in the leg, but consistent.

Welcome to Ironman training, where masochism is the barrier to entry. Now excuse me, I've got to lower myself onto the floor and start my evenings italic-nonitalic complaining.
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Star Spotting Of The Day: Lily Tomlin, 9 to 5 actress extraordinaire and one of the best parts of the latter West Wing seasons

Location: Walking up the sidewalk right smack dab in front of my household.

What She Was Doing: Truth be told, I'm not quite sure. She may have come out of the house up the street and across the way. She walked down the sidewalk, across the street and back up the sidewalk from whence she came, albeit on the other side of the street. All the while she was carrying a couple of very large bags that looked kinda like baby car seats in garbage bags. It was a bit weird. I'm still not sure what it was all about. That Lily Tomlin, always the mysterious one.

Good - It Rhymes with "Holy Shit"

Coach Gareth just sent over our training schedule for June, the last full month of training before the Ironman extravaganza. It looks good. That is, it looks good if you consider "good" to be 20-30 hours per week of exercise. If you consider "good" to be a 2 1/2 hour ride and ninety minute run starting at 4:30 or 5am on a weekday then, yep, this is good. If when you hear the word "good" you immediately dream of six to seven hour bike rides followed by thirty to sixty minute runs, then this is the training schedule for you. If when you dream of "good" you have visions of high intensity 2 mile swims coinciding with one to two hour runs followed by an hour of weight lifting, then, by golly miss molly, have I got a training program for you.

As for me, well, I must say.... it looks good.
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Star Spotting Of The Day: Al Teller, former Chairman and CEO of MCA Music, former President of Columbia and CBS records. (I'm not sure this one is actually a "star" but he's a recognizable figure in the business world. Well... recognizable in the entertainment world, at the very least. Ummm..... the music world?? OK, OK, maybe I'm stretching here... Maybe he's not recognizable at all. Jeez, why you gotta be so harsh today...)

Location: Whole Foods in Santa Monica

What He Was Doing: Rifling through the bagel bin in his baseball cap and sunglasses. You can always tell somebody who is looking to get noticed - they're the ones wearing the sunglasses indoors. For all you people out there who think that wearing sunglasses inside will make you incognito, let me help bring you a little closer to reality: it doesn't work. You might want to wear a big chicken suit, that oughta have just about the same effect.

Happy Festivus!

Post Race Recovery Morning Workout
BIKE
1 hour 15 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Recovery

Random Comments: Because of back-to-back races, our need to taper and a seemingly mis-timed training schedule, Cat and I are in our fifth straight "recovery" week. We started our Ironman training somewhere around Christmas time and have been pushing forward since then. Back around New Years Day everybody was telling us that we're so far ahead of schedule in terms of training so all seemed to be going fine. Until five weeks ago, that is. You see, aside from the two races over the past three weeks, we really haven't had much of a hard workout since somewhere around Tax Day and won't be having anything challenging to do until well after Memorial Day. I hope that means that we'll be pushing the limits of endurance far beyond Independence Day because we will probably have to start this damn tapering again on Argentina's Independence Day. For Godsakes, our bikes get shipped to Lake Placid on Puzzle Day, we get on a plane and fly east on Flitch Day and then it's only a few short days, if not hours, until there we are, smack dab in the middle of National Hot Dog Day, National Vanilla Ice Cream Day and, oh yeah, that Ironman race.


(As a side note, let me just make it clear that Flitch Day is one of my all-time favorite holidays. It stems from a long-ago custom whereby bacon was given to married couples who could prove they had lived in harmony and fidelity for one year. Flitch Day was, in essence, marriage judgement day. Very few, unfortunately, "took home the bacon.")

The Recovery Conundrum

Morning Post-Race Recovery Workout
SWIM
1500 meters straight and slow

AQUA JOG
6 minutes

JACUZZI
10 minutes

Random Comments: This is day three of our post-race recovery week and I already feel like I've gained five pounds. Apparently this morning's six minute aqua jog and ten minute jacuzzi didn't burn enough calories to negate the entire pizza and the half container of faux ice cream that I devoured last night as I lay lifeless on the couch. It's a catch 22 this recovery week malarkey. It's supposed to make you feel all good and relaxed when what it really does is make you want to go out and get your exercise on. Harumph. Oh look, it's almost dinner time.

Welcome To Auburn. Please Fasten Your Seatbelts, This'll Be A Bumpy Ride

There is a turning point in every race. Some people think it is a gradual turning point, like the frog in the boiling water, where the pain builds up to such a level that eventually you just can't stand it anymore. I disagree. I don't think it's gradual, I think that turning point happens all on its own. It becomes one singular moment in time that emerges as the defining moment of the race. And it is at that moment in which you are forced to confront the person you truly are.

For me, it is mile 11 of the Half Ironman run.

As you know, Cat and I raced the Auburn Triathlon this weekend. The race also goes by the name "World's Toughest Half Ironman" and, let me tell you, after having done raced the darn thing, I can attest to the validity of that moniker. In a nutshell, this race is a bitch. No, I take that back, it's not so much a bitch as it is a black widow. It's that gorgeous, seductively alluring nymphette that embraces you lovingly in her arms until she violently and unexpectedly disembowels you, leaving you lifeless and worn, stranded on the curbside as a protein enhancement for the circling vultures.

Other than that, it's a great race.

It starts with a swim in the pristine, 68 degree Folsom Lake that is nestled at the bottom of the surrounding mountains. The lake is as flat as a pancake and with only 300 people competing in the whole darn shebang, there is relatively little hitting, poking, smacking and jostling for position. Half Ironman swims really don't get much better than that. However, when you get out of the water and the announcer says “good luck, the easy part is over” you know you’re in trouble.

The bike started climbing from the moment my butt hit the saddle and it didn’t seem to let up for the next 56 miles. The first incredibly hard, out-of-the-saddle, 12% incline climb was at mile 3. Fortunately, since we'd already been climbing for three miles, I didn't have to tire my legs out on that one climb - they were tired already. How nice. But that was just a warm-up. You see, it got worse - much worse - with one climb leading to another and to another, and all leading up to arguably one of the most difficult climbs on the ride, strategically placed at mile 50 when your mind is saying to your legs "it's OK, there can't possibly be another steep climb in only 6 more miles of this godforsaken race".

Legend has it that multiple Tour De France winner Greg Lemond walked his bike up this hill – or at least the spray paint on the hill that says “Greg Lemond walked here” is proof enough. And reason enough for it to now be called “LemondWalked Hill”. Needless to say, I rode the entire short-but-steep way up, albeit at an excruciatingly slow pace – just short of losing my balance type pace.

The bike, though, was just a warm-up for the run, most of which took place on single-track and hiking trails, with a bit of gravel and shale thrown in for good measure, as well as a modicum of pavement. The first 2 miles of the run are downhill through the woods on a beautiful single-track trail. It feels great and it lulls you into that feeling of “wow, this run is a lot easier than they make it out to be”. That feeling quickly gets torn out of your head like a very large band-aid on a very hair chest.

The start of the run is at the “Overlook”, which is overlooking the river 2000 feet below. Essentially, you run down to the river and back up. Twice. Years ago they started building a dam on the river. At about mile 5 you run straight up the road that was part of the dam. It’s called the Dam Wall, for more than one reason. Most people walked (of course, Cat and I both ran it). It is incredibly steep for about a mile and a half at which point you’re at the top, pass by the finish line and head down to the bottom again. That is what we in the business call "adding insult to injury". This time around it’s a 2 mile gravel road that just goes down down down until you get to the sign that says “Turnaround," at which point you do, and you head back up up up. This is the hill that, for most people, seems to destroy what little ounce of hope they have left. As for me, having run up many a ski mountain (a hobby I've taken on over the years whenever I find myself in a ski resort during summer or fall), I’m used to just focusing my energy and pushing forward. That's what I did - head down, eyes ahead, one foot moving in front of the other, slowly increasing my speed inch by inch by inch.

Fortunately, you only had to run up one mile of this excruciatingly steep gravel road before you turn off into the woods at mile 11. Unfortunately, you turn off into the woods at mile 11 onto a trail called “Cardiac Bypass”.

As I mentioned previously, there is a defining moment in every race, and mine usually occurs around mile 11. This race was no different and the "Cardiac Bypass" sign surely didn't help matters. I tend to lose all hope at mile 11 and am brutally confronted with those self-defining choices. Do I stop and quit, and settle into the mediocrity of painlessness. Or am I a fighter. Do I stare this demon in the face and say something macho like "You wanna piece of this?! YOU WANNA PIECE OF THIS?!" Or maybe I pull out an old time classic like "Knock this battery off my shoulder.... I dare you, punk."

I face this choice every time I race a Half Ironman. And everytime, you know what I do? That's right, I put that battery on my shoulder. And instead of slowing down, I speed up. Instead of wincing in pain, I smile. And I go harder. And faster. You know why? F**k you, that's why. (See how macho I am?)**

So as I passed by the mile 12 aid station, continually picking up the pace, I asked them where Cat was (I knew she wasn’t too far in front of me). They told me she was about 1 minute ahead so I picked it up some more. In fact, I definitely ran in the 7:50ish zone for that last mile (which, by the by, paralleled a gorgeous mid-mountain stream the entire time) and finally caught her at the final hill on mile 13. We crossed the finish line together. Ain't that sweet? Yeah, I thought so too.

All in all, this was by far the prettiest race I’ve ever done. Beautiful swim in a calm lake at the base of the mountains. Incredibly gorgeous bike and run through forests, parks and rural areas. And since there were only 300-ish people doing the race, it was not uncommon to be completely alone out there – biking and running, completely surrounded by tall pine trees, with nobody else in sight, ahead or behind you, as far as the eyes can see. If it only weren't so goddam hilly.

That said, let me give a special shout-out to Brad Kearns, the ex-pro racer guy who puts on this classic event. Brad gives new meaning to race director, continuously going out of his way to help us (and others) out throughout the entire weekend. Thank you Brad for an incredible experience!

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** What with all the charges of plagiarism abound in this world, I feel it necessary to cite the influence for my macho comments above. (Truth be told, I don't feel it's necessary at all, I just love this movie and love this quote.) My macho inspiration is from the timeless classic, Good Will Hunting. Here you go.

Will: My father was an alcoholic. Mean fuckin' drunk. Used to come home hammered, looking to whale on someone. So I had to provoke him, so he wouldn't go after my mother and little brother. Interesting nights were when he wore his rings...
He used to just put a belt, a stick, and a wrench on the kitchen table and say, "Choose."

Sean: Well, I gotta go with the belt there.

Will: I used to go with the wrench.

Sean: Why?

Will: Cause fuck him, that's why.

Workouts With A Cherry On Top

Morning Workout
BIKE
1 hour
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1)

Random Comments: Sometimes it's the easiest workouts that are the most difficult to get motivated for. I mean, let's be real folks, a one hour easy spin?! For Godsakes, I'd probably be better off sleeping for an extra hour instead or, better yet, sitting at the local diner eating scrambled egg whites, a stack of potatoes (well-done, of course), a few links of sausage (turkey, please) and whole wheat toast (dry, thank you very much). You know what, while we're at it, why don't you throw in a tall stack of those chocolate chip, strawberry pancakes. They look really tasty. Feel free to be heavy on the syrup. Yeah, sure, throw some of that whip cream on top too - why not.

But the reality of it all is that I'm not at the diner and I'm not still in bed, I'm out on the bike for only one hour which, oddly enough, feels like it takes forever. These one hour easy spins are like purgatory. It's far from an excruciating workout and not quite a rest day. But it keeps the legs moving and the heart somewhere above comatose, which I guess is the point of it all. As for tomorrow, my workout consists of five 100 meter sprints in the pool with one minute of rest in-between. If I calculate correctly, which I do, the entire workout should take me a little less than 15 minutes. Of course, that doesn't count the 20 minutes of travel time.

Hmmm... maybe I'll find myself at the diner after all.
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We're Goin To Auburn

Morning Workout
RUN
15 minutes
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1)

SWIM
3000ish meters
Main Set: 3 x 600 meters off 30 seconds rest

Random Comments: It's an easy training week for us which, if I count correctly, is our 4th week of easy training in a row. Since next week is a recovery week, that'd be 5 straight weeks of easy training with less than two months to race day. Am I nervous about this? Hell yes I am! But the fact is that there are a few other things to be nervous about so that one will just have to wait in line. Cat and I are racing the Auburn Triathlon this weekend, a race that is also known by the somewhat daunting name: "World's Toughest Half." I'd imagine that one of the reasons they use this name is to instill fear in the race participants. I'd imagine another reason is that it looks good on t-shirts. I'm going to guess that both are true. All I know for sure is that there is a lot of uphill. A LOT of uphill. Which hurts almost as much as the downhill. And there's a lot of that too. Yep, this should be a nice, fun, relaxing weekend away with the girlfriend.
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Star Spotting Of The Day: David Paymer. Also known as "Hey, don't I know you from somewhere?"

Location: Starbucks in Santa Monica

What He Was Doing: Sitting at a table, enjoying a cuppa joe, reading some Robert Crais book and trying to ignore me as I kept looking at him every few seconds whilst I tried to figure out what the heck his name is. Finally, after an IMDB search for quite a few different movies and actors I had a hunch that I should look at the actors in City Slickers and - ba-da-bing - I figured it out. I found a David Paymer in a haystack. I'm proud of myself, thank you very much. And I was just a mere few seconds away from walking up to him and saying, "Hey, don't I know you from somewhere?"

I'm Going To Hell For This One

Morning Workout
BIKE
2 hours
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1), or as best as I can do to keep it that high

RUN
1 hour
Heart Rate Zone: Aerobic (Zone 1), or as best as I can do to keep it that low

Random Comments: My mother asked me how my workout went this morning. It went well, I said, it felt good. So that means your back is fine, your legs are fine? she inquired. That's about the point where I started stammering. Um......uh......

It's funny how one's standards become a bit askew after a few months of bodily destruction. For any normal person, a run that "felt good" might very well mean one where there was no pain or discomfort. I'd even go so far as to presume that a run that "felt good" would end with a sense of elation. Not so much for the first time Ironman-er. Yeah, my run today felt good, but that means it only took one mile for my shins to stop hurting, only three miles for my calves to loosen up, my tired quads slowed me down tremendously on the uphills but not enough for me to have to walk and the excruciating pain in my left leg didn't kick in until 7 minutes from the end of the workout. Oh, and when I finally finished, I was damn glad it was over. In a nutshell, that means there were no overall debilitating afflictions. I didn't fall to the ground, I didn't feel like giving up and didn't even have visions of the comfortable cots in the emergency room.

And that, my friends, is what I call a pretty good run.
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I give to charity as much as the next guy. Arguably even more so. Alzheimer's, AIDS, cancer, Girl Scout cookies.... I've donated to many a good cause in my time and I do it quite regularly. Hell, I also give to the homeless if they look very destitute.

Over the years, though, my charitable donations have come more in the form of checks in the mail, time at the shelter or trips to the Salvation Army. There are now so many homeless in Los Angeles, I'd end up just like them if I decided to donate to each and every one that approached me on the street. Besides, it's getting tougher to tell the difference between the true homeless and the scam artists - they're all wearing pretty nice sneakers.

I guess you can say I've become a bit more jaded. I still feel guilty when I turn somebody down as they're asking for money but, goshdarnit, I worked for this money and am entitled to what I have. I'll still give away to charity, but it's just not right to give money to every single person that asks. Which brings me to last night...

Cat and I went to the movies in the busy part of town where all the tourists and panhandlers like to mingle. They sit on the edge of the sidewalk with their signs (the panhandlers, that is, not the tourists). With all the competition out there for spare change, the panhandling signage has become a bit more creative or, shall I say, the panhandler with the best marketing gimmick wins. There are the homeless vets, the guy who just needs to buy food for his dog, the mother with four children who mysteriously are never with her, the lady that only needs $20 for gas, the double amputee and on and on it goes. It's a tough market. But I'll bet you that even the guy with the sign that says, "Let's face it, I just want a beer," is bringing in some good change every day.

Over the years, I've almost gotten used to passing them all by, of just saying "not today, sorry" and moving on with but a slight twinge of guilt flowing through my bones. So when the fellow with the clipboard approached me yesterday I didn't even think twice, not even breaking stride in the midst of the conversation I was having with Cat.

Can you assist with a donation to help the homeless children with AIDS for Mother's Day, he asked, extending the clipboard to show the authenticity of the claim and the extended list of previous donors.

Not today, sorry, I said in my usual brush-off tone and kept walking, my hand lovingly around Cat's shoulder. Realizing I wasn't going to budge, he turned away. Cat and I continued our conversation as we walked up the street.

About two blocks later, I stopped talking. Honey, I said. Did I just give the brush off to homeless children with AIDS?

Yes you did, sweetie, she replied. It was to help them for Mother's Day, too.

So I didn't help the homeless children with AIDS for Mother's Day, huh?

Nope, she confirmed.

In some odd way I felt pretty low about that one even though there was a definite marketing angle behind it all. I mean, I'm sure there are homeless children with AIDS out there needing my money. But Mother's Day? What do homeless children with AIDS have to do with Mother's Day anyway? Whatever...I still felt bad. And so I started thinking about it some more.

Does it matter if I've helped each category separately on different occasions, I thought. I've given to the homeless, the children and the AIDS foundation. Oh, and I've given my mother a Mother's Day card as well. Does that add up to the same thing or have I just committed some grave, unforgiveable sin by passing this man by? Maybe I need to focus my charitable efforts on the specific sub-category of homeless children with AIDS for Mother's Day. Perhaps I should go home and do an online search for this charitable organization that provides to such a precise group of needy.

But wait, what happens to the homeless children with AIDS after Mother's Day? Do they suddenly become better? Maybe with all the money they get for Mother's Day, they are able to buy homes and get treatment. Would it have been appropriate for me to say something along the lines of, I'm sorry, not today. However, I'd be more than happy to make a charitable donation to homeless children with AIDS for Rosh Hashanah. I would be grateful if you would contact me as the high holidays approach.

Perhaps then I could not only take care of the homeless children with AIDS, but I could also fulfill my religious donation allocation. If I could do that, than maybe I could divert some of my Holocaust Fund donations to the living children of today, albeit the homeless ones with AIDS.

This whole charitable donation business has become so difficult to manage these days. Which reminds me, I oughta tell you sometime how I was hoodwinked by the Girl Scouts. It's organized crime in a little green dress, I tell ya...

I'm Just A Patsy

Morning Workout
SWIM
2000 meters
Main Set: 2000 meters (that'd mean it was a non-stop swim, in case you was wondrin')

BIKE - RUN - BIKE - RUN - BIKE - RUN
Heart Rate Zone: 15 minutes on bike at SST (Zone 4)/VO2 (Zone 5+), then a 2 kilometer run at SST (Zone 4) / VO2 (Zone 5+). Recover for 3 minutes. Rinse. Repeat. Then repeat again.

Random Comments: I've been having goggle problems lately. The problem is that they don't like my face. When I put the goggles on and get in the pool, everything is nice and fine. But the moment I start to swim they suddenly fill up about halfway with water. It's like they're mocking me. You want to swim underwater, they ask rhetorically in their best mob-tinged Guido-like accent. You gotta deal with me first, bucko. I control the water supply around here, the goggles mock in their derogatory tone.

Its funny how you can swim for months without a problem and then, [snap!] just like that, without any adjustments having been made, they suddenly don't stay on the face correctly. I tighten, I loosen - but mostly I just swear out loud and get frustrated. I aggressively slash the goggles off my face and shake them about the air in horror as if I could choke the frustration right out of these seemingly useless plastic annoyances. This morning it took four stops, 500 meters and a fair bit of goggle choking for me to finally get the darn things working correctly.

As for the rest of the swim, well, once I finally came to my understanding with the goggles, when we all realized who was boss, it went fairly well. That is, until I finally finished and hit the "stop" button on my watch. I looked at the watch in horror. Apparently, somewhere along the way the watch decided not to work as well.

I smell an accoutrement conspiracy brewing.
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And Don't It Feel Good

There are certain understood rules of triathlon; certain things that triathletes know they should never – not ever - do before a race. Of course, the most common order is to not try anything new on race day for any reason whatsoever, even if the Lord God Herself and her harp-strumming naked cherubs appeared in some inspirational vision during your warm-up and told you otherwise. Just tell her no (Of course, you may go to hell, but I’m talking about race day here, not eternity. You’re on your own for eternity.) If you’ve been training effectively by eating cold pizza mid-way through your training rides and have a hankering to try out Gu during race day – don’t. Go find a pizza place. Want to adjust the saddle just a wee bit on race morning to make yourself more aerodynamic? Instead you might consider having a fellow triathlete take a baseball bat to your back. Oh, and here’s my tool kit, why don’t you saw out your pancreas while you’re in the mood to do stupid things.

Important Rule #2: Don’t listen to random radio stations on your drive to the race - you never know what song they will play right before you get out of the car. The Gods of Motivation don’t care how much you love or hate that song, they don’t even care if you listened to the entire song or just heard the first 8 bars, they are still going to imprint it on the forefront of your mind about 30 minutes into the race. You’ll be swimming along as calm, cool and collected as you can be on race day, focused on stroke after stroke when out of the blue it’ll hit you like the feet of that moron swimming two inches in front of your face. That song will suddenly pop right into your mind and you’ll immediately find yourself singing those lyrics. You may even start to smile and laugh for a little bit. Go ahead, amuse yourself. But know that the song ain’t leaving your brain for a long long time and four or five hours down the road when you’re still singing the same damn tune, that smile and laughter may be exchanged for something more on the angry and annoyed side of the emotional spectrum. Trust me, it is imperitive for your sanity and the potential physical health of those surrounding you that you listen to the right motivational songs before you begin your race.

Fortunately, we weren’t listening to the radio last week on our drive to St. Anthony’s. Unfortunately, my step-brother Craig didn’t need a radio.

Don't you hate when random songs pop into your mind and you can't let them go, Craig said to us. You know what song sometimes pops into my mind during a race? he asked in his rhetorical sort of way. And then he told us the song title. He didn't even need to sing it. The title was enough.

Aaaaawwwww shit, I thought. That’s it, I’m doomed. I don’t even need to hear the boppy beat of that timeless beauty for it to get lodged in my brain. Damn damn damn. The song title alone will have me humming it for far too long. Don’t think about it, I said. Everytime I started singing the song in my mind, I stopped myself. Don’t think about it. Don't think about it.

Lucky me, I must’ve figured out how to erase that part of my brain because I got through all of St. Anthony’s without the song piercing my consciousness. Whew, I thought after crossing the finish line. I'm free.

* * *

It was supposed to be an easy 90 minute spin on Wednesday morning. Sometimes there are so many signs telling me I shouldn’t be exercising, I wonder why I push forward. As for this quote-unquote easy spin, the omens began slapping me upside the head before I even really began:

• Woke up at Cat’s place and realized I forgot to bring my helmet (pre-ride)
• Flat tire (pre-ride) Stop and fix.
• Cadence sensor banging against pedal (30 seconds into ride) Stop and fix.
• Handlebars misaligned (60 seconds into ride) Stop and fix.
• Flat tire (yes, another one) (yes, the same tire) (5 minutes into ride) Stop and fix.
• Cat nearly getting clocked by a Subaru (20 minutes into ride). Shake and gasp.
• Both of us getting freaked out by a jerk in a pick-up truck (30 minutes into ride) Scream and yell.
• Me nearly getting flattened by a very large bus (40 minutes into ride). Clench and pray.

As you can imagine, I just wanted this ride to be over. In fact, I was unclear of why it began in the first place. I’d already had a crappy Lactate Threshold test the day before, I don’t know what I was trying to prove on this so-called easy spin. Truth be told, I could completely skip the workout and I’m sure my fitness level would not be affected in the slightest.

I was about an hour from home at this point when it happened. I didn't even see it coming. I mean, it was already 9 days after St. Anthony's, I thought I was free. Apparently I wasn't. Maybe it was the fear of the pending bus collision that knocked it out of me. Maybe it was the sheer annoyance of this ride and knowledge that I still had one more excruciatingly long hour to go. But I couldn't help myself. I smiled and laughed while I was riding along, singing the song. I silently cursed at Craig in my most sarcastic, light-hearted tone. I guess you just can't escape the power of pre-race suggestion.

So there I was, in the middle of my hellish bike ride, Walking On Sunshine, oh yeah. Walking on sunshine, oh oh.
And don’t it feel good!

Mama Never Told Me There'd Be Days Like These

Morning Workout
RUN
30 minutes in circles around the track
Heart Rate Zone: Lactate Threshold (Zone 2)

SWIM
Main Set: Supposed to be 4 x 400 meters but I only made it through 3 x 400 meters before the pool closed or I got frustrated enough to walk away - whichever came first.

Random Comments: This week sucks. I feel like I'm moving backwards in fitness with every workout I do. Honestly, I'm so frustrated I just want to quit all of this training. Screw the Auburn race next weekend. Forget Ironman. Forget it all. I'm done.

As you know, my Lactate Threshold testing on the bike earlier this week proved to me that after 5 months of training I've not improved at all. To the contrary, I've actually gone backwards in some areas. And then this morning's run, aside from the tremendous pain in the lower leg region, was so incredibly slow for such an incredibly high heart rate. In my better days, I'd run 7 minute miles for hours on end. Today, I'm struggling to hold 11 minute miles for 30 minutes. And then that leads to the swim, which this morning was more sink than swim. My arms weren't moving properly and it felt like I was flailing out there. Swimming is, by far, my least favorite of the three sports and unfortunately, by far, the one that I'm the best at. That in itself is annoying for a few reasons. First of all, I've been running for 25 years and biking for 12. I've only been swimming for 3 years. The numbers alone should indicate that I should be better at the other two. The fact is, I'm not even that good of a swimmer, I just have grown to suck at running and biking. As if that's not enough, the swim is such a minor part of Ironman (and triathlon in general). Of the 140-odd miles, I'm only swimming for 2.4 of them. Of the 13-15 hours I'll be out there, I'll only be swimming for 80 minutes. It means nothing. The fact that I'm a better swimmer than biker or runner makes me want to stop swimming altogether.

You must be in the best shape of your life, people say to me when they hear that Ironman is right around the corner.

No. I'm not. But thank you for reminding me.

The thing is, I know I'll have a workout sometime in the future that I'm going to feel great about. And my frustration will subside. But right now it hasn't. Right now I'm angry. And strike me down with lightning if that's what it'll take, but I just want to sit here and wallow alone in my discontent for a few minutes.

Wide Awake And Dreaming

Morning Workout
BIKE
Lactate Threshold testing
Heart Rate Zone: By the end of the test the ole pumper was pounding high enough for Coach Gareth to say things like "Are you feeling OK?" and "You sure you're going to be fine? Do you need water?" if that gives you any indication of how high the heart rate was in relation to, say, being in cardiac arrest.

Random Comments: Lactate Threshold testing time is always a barrel of monkeys. I mean, here I am with the opportunity to pedal my bike until I am just short of puking, where my legs are burning like hot coals from within and my heart rate, quickly surpassing "pulse" and "chop" mode, begins to escalate far beyond "puree," at which point I can sense that my engine has clearly surpassed the "do not rev beyond this red line" point and I almost begin to smell smoke coming out of my pores as if my whole body were about to implode into a charred corpse, inevitably resulting in nothing but a lifeless lump of used flesh hanging from the soiled posts of my bike. And, as if that's not enough, I get to pay a lot of money for this enthralling experience. Yep, it's nothing but fun times over here.

The good news is that I was able to push for one minute longer and harder than I ever have before. The bad news is that little else has improved in my conditioning over the past 5 months. At the slow aerobic levels, all seems to be fine with me. It's just when I start getting the heart rate up a little higher that it all goes to hell.

What does this mean, you ask? Well, in a nutshell, it means that I need to go really really slow at all times for any endurance event. Even just a five minute burst of mid-race energy could result in a long-term meltdown. Fortunately for me, that's the goal with Ironman. "Slow is smooth, smooth is fast." That's what they say. Apparently it's some sort of mantra that I'm supposed to be repeating to myself over and over again. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.

Yeah, well, we'll see how that one works out for us, won't we.
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It was 12:42 in the morning when I woke up the first time. I could see the digital light of the alarm clock over Cat's sleeping shoulder. It doesn't feel like 12:42am, I thought. It feels more like 6am. You know those times when you suddenly open your eyes in the middle of the night and you are wide awake? That's exactly the state I was in at 12:42 this morning. Wide awake. Laying in bed, thinking.

It was the swim at Lake Placid that was in my head. Maybe it was there because Cat had sent over pictures of the mayhem that kicks off the Ironman USA race. I wasn't thinking of those exact photos as I lay in bed, but that's probably what initiated the thoughts in the first place. The subconscious works in mysterious ways. I suppose that's why it's called the subconscious.

I lay still just thinking about the swim. And then I caught myself and began thinking about me thinking about the swim. And that thinking led to me wondering why the heck I was staying awake thinking about it in the first place. For Godsakes, you fool, the race is still 2 months away, I said to myself. Stop thinking about the damn thing and go to sleep. On and on I kept telling myself that. But the images of the swim crept in through the cracks. So I lay there thinking.

I looked over at the clock. 1:48 am. I can't believe I've been awake for an hour already, I thought as I battled heavy lids. I must've fallen asleep shortly thereafter.

It was thoughts of the bike ride at Lake Placid that woke me up at 3:05. I was riding that course in my mind, imagining myself staying slow, keeping it easy. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. It's tough for me to keep my heart rate down all the time, I thought to myself. I know it's tough. I imagined me trying to ride unbearably slow. Unbearably smooth. And I lay there thinking.

I woke up again at 5:17am and my mind was running. It was running with thoughts of the marathon at Lake Placid. How will I survive that run, I asked myself. It's just two half-marathons, I kept justifying. It won't be a problem. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. But what will my legs feel like. Will my quads finally give out? Will my achilles hold up? And what about those calves? My calves are always minutes away from total breakdown. Will I have to crawl forward? Will my stomach be strong enough? I kept questioning my abilities and my mind kept churning as I lay there thinking, trapped in the confines of my mental Ironman.

Cat woke up just before 6am.
74 days and counting.