Wavy Waconia

Beautiful, windy, day in Waconia.  I had bad swim.  Mainly due to the waves and my inability to learn from past mistakes.  Instead of adjusting my breathing and stroke more, I tried to muscle through the oncoming waves and swallowed a lot of water.  Requiring me to stop a couple of times and get my breath and clear myself.  Once I corrected, everything was good.  The damage was done though.  I had a very good bike on a long and hilly course.  I had a pretty good run on a fairly hilly course.  All in all I really cannot complain.  The good part.  At each of the 10 races in the Midwest Events Series Gear West gives away 6 great raffle prizes.  I won the gear bag with all the gear inside (worth 800 bucks!).  The big prize in the bag is the Speedo Fastskin II suit.  That makes up for any bad day.

Total- 188/431

Age - 22/38

Swim (880 yards) - 24:33 (2:48/100 yards)

T1 - 2:34

Bike (24 mi) - 1:07:57 (21.2 MPH)

T2 - 1:35

Run (4 mi) - 32:09 (8:03/mi)

Total - 2:08:45 (really wanted to go under 2 hours, always next year)

High Cliff Sprint

No pictures, forgot the camera.  Too bad it was a beautiful day.  Almost perfect.  

It was a great weekend in the Appleton area, nothing like the Darboy Chicken Festival to get your weekend going with the music stylings of Ryan Cabrera (no idea who he was until that morning before we went to the Chickenfest, could have spent the rest of my life not knowing).  Back to the race.  Water 70 air low 60s, nice fast swim, shallow water.  No more wet suit if going under half a mile, takes too long to change, I think.  Hill out of T1 was pure hell, High Cliff Road, after that it was rolling hills, not too bad.  Fastest bike split yet.  Run was a little tough, had to run up the hill we biked up, little cramping in the lower stomach area part way through.  Still pretty good.  Great day all in all.

Overall - 86/494

Age Group - 8/30

Swim (440 yards) - 7:51 (1:46 pace, pretty close to a PR)

T1 - 2:51

Bike (22 mi) - 1:00:45 (21.7 MPH)

T2 - 1:19

Run (3.1 mi) - 25:32 (8:14 min/mi)

Total - 1:38:17

Escape From Alcatraz

It took me a long time to post this, I wanted to do it sooner. Busy, busy
San Francisco is amazing. It is so beautiful there. The race course is incredible.
Up at 2AM, at the race site too early, about 4AM, didn't let anyone in until about 4:30. Got all my stuff sorted out. Got on the bus, got to the boat, had to wait about half an hour to get body marked. Got to watch the sunrise, which is always amazing. Finally got marked and on the boat. All those people, ~1800, just incredible. They do a loop around Alcatraz, then the pros go and then we all go. Controlled mayhem of sorts. We go out through two doors, and then out through 1 of 3 openings in the railing. It is amazing to watch all those people in the water. The swim was not that bad, water cold initially. About half way across there were some rollers. Strange to swim without bouys, just follow the cell tower and let the current push you towards the beach. I am amazed I hit the beach after all the stories. T1 was long.
Bike was frightening, the downhills are incredible and I don't have the bike handling skills to be aggressive enough. Used a lot of break. Again, the views were amazing, just unbelievable.
The run course is much the same. Along the bay, under the bridge. I took a hard fall, avoiding a branch, hit a slippery rock, scraped knee and bad wound on left hand. Bloody 5 miles. Running on the beach is terrible, heavy, poor footing, sand in shoes, ugh. Sand stairs\ladder. Ugh, 400 steps of pure hell. I was not very fast, about 3 hours 16 minute, but the point was to do it. It felt great. It was an amazing experience, hopefully I can do it again next year. Hooray
Swim (1.5 mi) - 37:03 (1:24 min/100yds)
T1 - 9:24
Bike (18 mi) - 1:11:29 (15.1 MPH)
T2 - ? (apparently issues with the timing mat)
Run (8 mi + T2 apparently) - 1:08: 23 (Guess with timing mat)
Total - 3:16:19
Overall - 946\1617
Age - 149\239

Pigman!

Sunday was a beautiful day in Palo, IA.  Clear, Sunny, and by the end of the race it was almost, if not 80 degrees.  I had a pretty good swim.  About 3/4 of the way through had a little trouble breathing, did a little breaststroke, swam a little more, did a little more breaststroke, and finished.  Had a good bike.  I am surprised I was as fast as I was.  A lot of bike traffic, people not staying to the right,  and car traffic.  The car traffic made me nervous, some of the drivers did not look very happy,  My run was a little slower than I would have liked.  Overall, it was a very good day.  It would have been a good race to watch.  The Equalizer (elite women get a head start on the elite men and there is an extra bonus for first finisher) resulted in a fairly close finish.  David Thompson passed Cathy Yndestad at the end of the run.   The difference between elite 4th and 5th was 4 seconds.  It would have been exciting to watch the finishes.

Swim (547 yards) - 9:27 (1:44 min/100yds)

T1 - 3:44 (I have to work on my T1.  Trouble getting the suit off)

Bike (15.5 mi) - 44:13 (21.1 MPH)

T2 - 1:43

Run (3.1 mi) - 24:42 (7:57 min/mi)

Total - 1:23:47

Overall - 145/606

Age - 21/53

People I Admire, Respect, etc

I don't know why, but I was thinking about people I respect, admire, enjoy listening to, etc.  People who are not in my family or friends, so famous or semi-famous people

No particular order

Keith Olbermann

Jon Stewart

Dave Matthews

Rachael Madow

Garrison Keillor

Stephen Colbert

Tina Fey

Russ Feingold

Ira Glass

Sarah Vowell

There are more, but this is what came to me today.  For some reason

Windmills

There is something about windmills, both haunting and beautiful.  I don't know what it is.