Welcome to my blog! This blog is a tool that I am using in an effort to lose weight. My hope is that by publicly tracking my weight and my efforts to reduce it, I will do just that. However, there is more to my life than just trying to lose weight. Along the way, I will share some of that also. Thanks for reading.

About Me

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South Jordan, Utah
I am the husband of one,and the father of four. Most days I even like them all. I love them every day.

Friday, November 5, 2010

A LONG WAY FOR A GATORADE

Finally, I have a chance to get back on here and catch up.  This week has been so busy.  I worked Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.  Three straight 13 hour days tend to put everything else in my life on hold.

It's been kind of frustrating because my Ironman started Monday and I have felt like I haven't really had a chance to work on it.  I am still stressed about the swimming mostly.  Now I have to try doing it on the weekend and I know the pool will be crowded.  The pool only has two lanes, and it's rare that someone or multiple people aren't in them.  I am not a strong enough, confident enough swimmer, to jump in a lane and share it with multiple people.

Monday was a day off and I thought I would try getting some of the swimming done to relieve my anxiety.  After taking care of my parental responsibilities in the morning, I went down to the pool in the afternoon.  It just happened to be the time that one of the youth swim teams was having a practice.  There were about 30 kids crammed into those two lanes.  No swimming done, increased anxiety.  When would I get some pool time in?  I headed home thinking I could get a couple of hours on my bike before it got dark.  I was certainly frustrated.  When I got home, Heidi suggested that I wait and try to swim after dinner, thinking the pool might be less crowded in the late evening.  What did I have to lose?  I got back to the pool a little after 8:00 hoping to find empty lanes.  Wrong.  One lane had a father and daughter in it, the other a young boy.  I figured they were all together and that if I got in the lane with the boy, he would get scared of the big man and move over with his dad and sister.  By the time I had changed into my swim trunks and entered the pool, the boy was nowhere to be seen.  The lane was mine.  That's the good news.  The bad news was that the pool closed at 9:00, not 10:00 like everything else.  That left me with only 40 minutes to swim.  It's times like that I wish I was a good swimmer.  Forty minutes later I had completed 28 laps, not bad for me. Only 142 more to go.  Note to self, don't swim after eating tacos again.  I was tasting those tacos the rest of the night.  They were good the first time. Thanks Heidi.

Working the next three days meant early morning runs.  That was my plan when I signed up for the Ironman.  Swim and bike on my days off, running the mornings on days I worked.  Tuesday came and went, zero miles ran.  Wednesday morning I found the strength to pull myself out of bed.  It hasn't gotten any easier to get up in the mornings for a run.  Probably never will.  It helped that Heidi was meeting her friend April to run that morning also.  I managed to pound out 5.66 miles in just under an hour.  And it was a pounding.  I never felt like I could get into a good rhythm.  My hip has been really bothering me since my run last Thursday.  I think my last two runs, about 18 miles, on the inside track at the fitness center affected my hip.  Running on that little track put a lot of pressure on my inside leg during all those turns.  Whatever the reason, my hip has been hurting to the point that this was my first run in a week.  About 1.5 miles into my run I considered turning around for home.  My hip was hurting, and even though I wanted to run I didn't want to do more damage to my hip.  And I knew that Heidi wasn't home to call for a rescue pick up.  I didn't want to get too far away from home and then have to limp home arriving too late to get ready and get to work on time.  I chose to continue on.  I figured the worse that could happen is that I would have to walk home and get to work a little late.  I'll take that risk.  I walked for 1/4 mile trying to stretch it out a little and then finished my run.  As awkward as I felt, kind of felt like I was running with one leg shorter than the other one, I still finished my run close to my normal pace.  In the process, I left 997 calories out there looking for a handicap permit.

Thursday morning's run was pretty much a repeat of Wednesday's.  My hip was still sore.  It causes me to shorten my stride with my right leg.  Because my left leg isn't smart enough to realise that something is wrong on the other side, it continues to take a full stride.  Or maybe it's like a brother/sister thing.  My left leg (brother) sees the right leg (sister) suffering but continues to take a full stride to tease and irritate the sister.  This leaves me feeling like I am running on a right leg that is shorter than my left.  Not real comfortable. I have to keep getting between brother and sister to separate them.  While trying to keep the family peace, I ran 6.72 miles and left 1183 calories on the road promising to be nice to each other if I wouldn't spank them.  I spanked them anyways, hard.  Now they're someone else's problem.  That's 12.38 miles of running so far, only 14 more to go to complete the running requirement.

Today was going to be such a good day.  I was going to get 75 miles of bike riding done.  Heidi was going to be sleeping after working last night.  The younger kids were going to be at the daycare.  It was just going to be me and my bike.  And the day was beautiful. Sunny, no wind, and probably close to 70 degrees.  Perfect.  Then life got in the way.  A couple of times during the year we get an extra employee discount at the Smith's Marketplace.  Today was one of those days.  They really come in handy, especially with Christmas next month.  Heidi was tired after working all night.  I guess that's a good enough excuse.  So I was chosen to get some of the Christmas shopping done.  No problem.  I had the list.  In and out in less than an hour.  Right.  You can't shop on one of these days without running into people you have worked with at other stores.  And you can't just say hi and then keep shopping.  You have to stop and talk about your kids, hear all the gossip from each others current store, etc.  That one hour shopping trip soon turns into three.  But it was soon over, money was saved, it was time to ride.


I had Brooke take this picture before I left and she proved herself to be all girl.  She commented that my new black and yellow helmet didn't match my shirt or my bike.  That's why she picked a white helmet, so that it would always match her clothes.  I told her that it was ok because when it's on my head I can't see it.  Because I was getting a later start than I had originally planned, I knew that I wasn't going to be able to get in the full 75 miles.  Heidi had some afternoon meetings at her work, which meant that I would have to be back to pick up the boys at 5:30.  But I figured that I had enough time to get in at least 50 miles.  My plan was an out and back ride to Cedar Fort.  I have done this ride before and knew that it was 50 miles.                      

When I got to Cedar Fort I stopped at the one store that is in the small town and bought a Gatorade to drink and take a break before turning back around for home.  As I was obviously riding a bike, the cashier was asking me some questions about cycling and commenting on the perfect weather.  She made the comment that I had ridden a long way to buy a Gatorade.  I told her they always taste better if I ride a long way to get one.  And it did taste good.  The Gatorade was gone too soon.  Time to ride for home.                               



It was a perfect ride.  As the picture shows, I got back home at 5:10, just in time to pick up the boys at 5:30.  I always hate riding when I know I have to be home at a certain time.  Those are usually the times that something will go wrong.  It just adds a little pressure to the ride when you are on a schedule.  I put 53.30 more miles on my new back tire.  It's so nice when the tires cooperate, unlike my last ride in the Eagle Mountain area.  I dropped 4199 calories on the road to feast on all the roadkill.  I think I saw more roadkill on my ride today than any of my other rides, ever.  When you are riding a bike, and you are breathing hard, stinky, rotting roadkill is not what you want to frequently encounter.  And the fourth number in the picture, zero.  Today I had zero incidences.  No flat tires, no ruined tires that need to be replaced, no crashes, no mechanical issues, nothing.  Only 70 more miles left to complete the biking requirement of the Ironman.  Why can't swimming be this easy? 

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